HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – A couple of statebred optional-claiming races will spice up Sunday’s 11-race program, with the ninth race at 5 1/2 furlongs on the dirt and the 10th carded at 1 1/16 miles over the inner turf. Each has a purse of $40,000.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Laddie Liam, winner of the Maryland Juvenile Futurity on Dec. 7, was purchased at auction by Leonard Green’s D J Stable and has been turned over to trainer Gary Contessa.

Laddie Liam, a Maryland-bred son of Golden Lad, was purchased for a sale-record $450,000 at Tuesday’s Fasig-Tipton Midatlantic winter mixed sale at the Maryland State Fairgrounds in Timonium.

Contessa said Laddie Liam will be nominated to the $150,000 Jerome on New Year’s Day, a race that is being targeted by impressive Nashua Stakes winner Independence Hall.

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – Mind Control and Haikal, stakes-winning 3-year-olds at last winter’s Aqueduct meet, both put in workouts on a very busy Friday morning at Belmont Park, preparing to return from lengthy layoffs and get ready for their 4-year-old campaigns.

Trainer Steve Asmussen and jockey David Cabrera are on pace to win their respective titles at Remington when the meet closes Sunday.

Asmussen had won 74 races at the meet through Thursday night, 19 more than second-leading trainer Karl Broberg. Asmussen is a 14-time training title winner at Remington, where he set a record for trainer wins on a card – seven – on Sept. 29. Horses in his care this meet had earned $1.9 million through Thursday.

Remington Park has put up some strong handle figures this meet – including a record Oklahoma Derby Day – and officials are hoping for a big finale Sunday when the season closes with the $400,000 Springboard Mile.

The Kentucky Derby points race is one of six stakes on a 13-race card that has a special afternoon post of 3 p.m. Central. The program drew an average 10.3 horses a race.

“We’re hoping we handle in the neighborhood of $2.5 to $3 million,” said Matt Vance, vice president of racing operations for Remington.

Santa Anita officials were advised by the California Horse Racing Board on Thursday to proceed with caution regarding racing in wet weather at the track’s winter-spring meeting, which begins on Dec. 26.

An eight-page paper was presented at Thursday’s board meeting dictating protocols on whether racing can be conducted in the event of hot weather, high winds, lightning, or rain.

In the event of rain, no training will take place on a sealed racetrack, the document stated.

Bill Scherlis, a track photographer at Del Mar and the Los Angeles County Fair in Pomona, died on Dec. 1 at the age of 96, according to Del Mar publicity officials.

A native of Philadelphia, Scherlis had been living in a care facility for more than a year. At an advanced age, he still was an annual visitor to the Del Mar summer meeting in recent years. Scherlis was track photographer at Del Mar from 1945 to 1975 and photographer at the Los Angeles County Fair for 54 years.

Hall of Fame trainer Jerry Hollendorfer is scheduled to seek a motion for preliminary injunction in Los Angeles Superior Court allowing him to start horses at the Santa Anita winter-spring meeting, according to his attorney. The meet begins Dec. 26.

Hollendorfer has not stabled or raced horses in his name at Santa Anita since late June, when he was told to vacate his stalls after four of his runners were euthanized as a result of injuries sustained while training or racing since late December 2018.

Real News’s first start since June came Thursday at Fair Grounds and produced another fine turf-sprint performance. The 3-year-old Al Stall-trained colt stalked the pace in a second-level allowance race, took over in midstretch, and ran resolutely through the wire to post a 1 1/4-length victory under Colby Hernandez.

“He ran a perfect race. Broke good, rated well, heard that horse coming after he made the lead, and just coasted home,” said Stall, who trains Real News for Town and Country Racing and Gary Broad.

Change of Control cleared her first allowance condition scoring a 36-1 upset last May in the $98,000 Mamzelle Stakes at Churchill. She stands a good chance of getting through her second allowance condition in the featured eighth race Sunday at Fair Grounds.