ARCADIA, Calif. - Excuses, excuses, excuses. Funny thing is, handicappers analyzing the best race on the Oak Tree card Thursday may arrive at the sensible conclusion most of the alibis are legitimate. They are for Morocco.

Assistant trainer Gary Mandella said Morocco "may have had the worst trip at Del Mar of any of our horses."

He's not exaggerating. Morocco, dead last turning for home in a six-furlong sprint Aug. 17, was weaving deftly through traffic until his luck ran out at the eighth pole. He got stopped cold, and was blocked full of run the final sixteenth.

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - Rain has turned into trainer Chris Block's worst enemy. When Block decided to bypass the Grade 1 Beverly D. with the turf mare Ioya Two, he mapped out a late-summer campaign that would get Ioya Two to her winter quarters in Florida. Two months later, that plan has fallen apart, and Ioya Two has yet to run since winning the Grade 3 Modesty here in late July.

In August, rain washed the Reluctant Guest from turf onto the main track, and Block scratched Ioya Two. The same thing happened again last Saturday in the Top Corsage Stakes.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Steady Ruckus, winner of last year's Bunty Lawless Stakes, will prep for another crack at that race in Thursday's allowance feature at Woodbine, a seven-furlong turf dash.

Steady Ruckus, a chestnut gelding by Bold Ruckus, won his first stakes in the 2000 Bunty Lawless, a one-mile grass race restricted to Ontario-sired runners. He battled up front through rapid fractions in that race, and won in a gutsy performance over Impeachable Sin and River Boat.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. - For trainer Buddy Delp, most of the time he has spent campaigning Include over the last two seasons has been a trip down memory lane. As Include's star has risen in the handicap division, it makes sense that Delp would try him in some of the same races that Delp once dominated with Spectacular Bid.

POMONA, Calif. - The Los Angeles County Fair ended its 2001 meet on Monday with only a 2 percent loss in overall handle, despite the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11 that led to cancellation of one day of the scheduled 18-day meet at Fairplex Park.

Overall handle was $104,203,615 for a 17-day meet, a daily average of more than $6.1 million. Ontrack handle fell 3 percent; intertrack wagering was down 5 percent; and out-of-state handle grew 4 percent. Ontrack attendance fell 2 percent to 121,497, an average of 76,146 per day.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - Any concerns that this year's Canadian International would be lacking in European representation were dispelled when Mutamam, Daliapour, Zindabad, and Paolini checked in late Monday for Sunday's Grade 1, $1.5 million race.

Mutamam, Daliapour, and Zindabad flew in from London, while Paolini - accompanied by stablemate Abitara, who will run in Sunday's Grade 1, $500,000 E.P. Taylor - came from Frankfurt.

Owned by Sheikh Hamdan Al Maktoum and trained by Alec Stewart, Mutamam will be well supported in the Canadian Inter-

ARCADIA, Calif. - Until Sept. 11, trainer Eoin Harty planned to start two contenders in Grade 1 races Sept. 16 at Belmont Park - Imperial Gesture in the Matron and Essence of Dubai in the Futurity. But when those two races for 2-year-olds were canceled because of the terrorist attacks, he drafted a new campaign.

Justnowayofknowin', owned by Kenwood Racing, seems well spotted to earn the second win of his career in Thursday's featured seventh event at Bay Meadows.

The six-furlong allowance/optional claiming dash attracted a field of eight competing for the $32,000 purse.

One horse is making all the difference in the makeup of the Ohio Derby.

If Macho Uno runs, then only four or five 3-year-olds may oppose him Saturday in the $300,000 Ohio Derby, the Grade 2 race that highlights the annual racing season at Thistledown in the Cleveland suburb of North Randall.

But if trainer Joe Orseno decides not to ship Macho Uno from New York on Thursday, then as many as 10 or more could start in the 1 1/8-mile race.

ARCADIA, Calif. - Many autumns ago, the Oak Tree meet at Santa Anita marked the symbolic conclusion to a season of racing. But the game has changed.

Championships are now won and lost at the Breeders' Cup in late fall, forever changing the Oak Tree meet, which this year starts Wednesday at Santa Anita. Instead of finality, the 32-day meet provides transition. Instead of resolution, the meet generates expectations, realistic or otherwise.