VANCOUVER, B. C. - It took a while for apprentice Nicola Wright to get her North American riding career started, but once it began she wasted no time making her presence felt.

Wright, a 24-year-old native of Wales, rode for the first time at Hastings Park on Sept. 29 and won with her second mount, guiding the Darryl Snow-trained Quins Return wire to wire against $5,000 fillies and mares.

Wright returned Sunday and brought the Michael Turner-trained B. B. Bunny from far back to score a $23.80 surprise in the day's sixth race.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Janet, the upset winner of the $500,000 Yellow Ribbon Stakes on Sept. 29, may start in the Breeders' Cup Filly and Mare Turf at Belmont Park on Oct. 27 despite previous comments to the contrary by her connections.

Trainer Darrell Vienna said Thursday that owners Jed and Roberta Cohen must pay a $90,000 supplemental fee to make Janet eligible and not the maximum of $200,000. The victory in the Yellow Ribbon was worth $300,000.

"The sire was nominated, so it's a more reasonable penalty," Vienna said.

One of the few things working against Ceeband in Saturday's $100,000 California Sprint Championship at Bay Meadows is the race's six-furlong distance.

Ceeband is already a graded stakes winner, having won the Grade 2 Triple Bend Breeders' Cup Handicap at Hollywood Park in July, and is trained by John Sadler, who is having a strong year. Plus, he will be ridden by top jockey Russell Baze.

But the California Sprint Championship, restricted to state-breds, may be too short for Ceeband, Sadler fears. All of his five career wins have been over 6 1/2 and seven furlongs.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - It was five years ago in the Phoenix Breeders' Cup Stakes that Forest Wildcat won by a length over Valid Expectations, with Bet on Sunshine third.

On Saturday, while Forest Wildcat has 3-year-olds and Valid Expectations has 2-year-olds in training at racetracks across North America, the 9-year-old gelding Bet on Sunshine will race in the Phoenix for the fifth time, a reign of longevity that Keeneland officials believe is a record.

ANDERSON, Ind. - As the fall harvest begins in the grain fields surrounding Hoosier Park, Saturday's $300,000 Indiana Derby has drawn a bumper crop of its own.

A crack field of 12 3-year-olds, including graded stakes performers from the East Coast, Midwest, and South, will hook up at 1 1/16 miles in the seventh, and deepest, edition of the Indiana Derby, this track's richest race.

Trainer Anthony Dutrow holds the strongest hand as he sends out the coupled entry of Saratoga Games and Burning Roma, who is rapidly approaching millionaire status.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - In the final sixteenth of a mile, the Arlington Matron could become a war of attrition. Saturday's Grade 3 handicap drew a field of seven fillies and mares when entries were taken Thursday: They have combined to go 1-for-17 in races at nine furlongs, the Matron's distance. The question is who will be finishing at the wire.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - Dick Lundy has taken a job as the private trainer for owner Ernie Paragallo, the latest step in Lundy's return to national prominence. Lundy will oversee a string of 40 to 50 horses that will be split this winter between Aqueduct and Fair Grounds, Lundy has based at Arlington the last two summers and wintered in Florida last year. In the 1980's he trained for the Payson stable before becoming the private trainer for Alan Paulson, overseeing 125 regally-bred horses.

Few horses have raced at as many different venues as Mystic Lady. Over the past 12 months, she has run near the Atlantic Ocean in Miami and New Jersey, in the mountains of upstate New York, and in cities as big as New Orleans and as small as Hot Springs, Ark.

To be precise, trainer Mark Hennig has taken Mystic Lady on a tour of 10 different racetracks since last November. She adds Philadelphia Park to her long list of travel destinations Saturday when she heads a field of seven 3-year-old fillies for the $250,000 Cotillion.

Stormy Pick, a two-time stakes winner at Monmouth Park during the summer, holds a class advantage over seven 3-year-old filly sprinters she will face in the $100,000 Stormy Blues Breeders' Cup Handicap at Pimlico.

Stormy Pick has familiar foes. A winner of six races in 13 lifetime starts for trainer Ben Perkins Jr., Stormy Pick displayed the ability to stay close to the pace and then draw clear when asked in both the Dearly Precious and the Miss

Woodford, both at six furlongs.

Vitrina Cat, a wire-to-wire winner in her North American stakes debut, tries to make it two in a row in the $75,000 Open Fire Stakes at Delaware Park.

Vitrina Cat, a 4-year-old Argentine-bred filly, won three consecutive group stakes in her native country to close out her 2000 season. Now trained by Alan Goldberg, Vitrina Cat needed three races to acclimate herself to the United States.