The expiration this year of the broadcast contracts for the three Triple Crown races and the decision by Churchill Downs to install permanent lighting has raised suggestions that Churchill might run the Kentucky Derby at night in the near future.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Steeplechase champions, turf champions, a 2-year-old champion, even a sprint champion in Informed Decision, who won her Eclipse in 2009: Jonathan Sheppard has trained top-class runners of widely divergent types. One thing Sheppard has not done is start a horse in a Triple Crown race, but if things go well over the next two weeks, that will change in the Preakness Stakes, the race to which Sheppard is pointing lightly raced and promising Bushwhacked.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Jeremy Noseda, the trainer of Gotham Stakes winner Awesome Act, said he believes a wet track would benefit his horse in Saturday's Kentucky Derby.

"I hope the heaven's open," Noseda said. "I'd love to see the race be run on a sloppy track. I have a hunch he'd love a sloppy track. I might be sitting here Saturday afternoon 'Why did I think that?' but I think it might suit my horse and compromise others."

Part of Noseda's hunch was confirmed Tuesday when Awesome Act worked a solid half-mile in 48.44 seconds and galloped strongly over a wet track.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Regardless of their post-time odds, there has been plenty of buzz concerning three of trainer Todd Pletcher's four Derby starters. There has been virtually no discussion of the Pletcher-trained Discreetly Mine.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Wayne Lukas almost requires his own page in the Kentucky Derby media guide. Forty-three Lukas-trained 3-year-olds have contested the Derby. Four have won, equaling the second-highest training total in the race's 135-year history. For 20 years in a row, from 1981 to 2000, Lukas had at least one starter in the race.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Not that she wanted to find out, but now Shannon Ritter knows how it feels to get so close, only to suffer a crushing blow.

Ritter trains Endorsement, who was withdrawn from the Kentucky Derby on Wednesday morning at Churchill Downs after suffering a condylar fracture of his right front ankle following what was to be his final workout for the Derby. Ritter, who was aboard Endorsement for the work, knew while walking back to the barn that something was amiss.

"I noticed it when we were walking home," she said.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The first time trainer Bob Baffert ran a horse in the Kentucky Derby, in 1996, Cavonnier lost by a nose, leaving Baffert in what he will readily admit was a year-long funk.

"That was the most brutal beat of my career," he recalled Tuesday morning at Churchill Downs.

At the time Baffert had been regularly training Thoroughbreds for less than a decade. And while he had already won a Breeders' Cup race with Thirty Slews, the Triple Crown stage was foreign to him.

"I was devastated," he said. "I didn't know if I could get back."

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - As the son of a trainer, Dale Romans grew up around Churchill Downs. He has seen plenty of changes over the years. The twin spires no longer dominate the rooftop, there are skyboxes atop the length of the grandstand and clubhouse, and now lights encircle the track.

To anyone who thinks Sidney's Candy can be beat in the 136th Kentucky Derby next Saturday at Churchill Downs, jockey Joe Talamo has just one question:

"Who dat?"

This has been quite a year for Talamo. He appeared in the TV show "Jockeys." He went on the "Tonight" show during Conan O'Brien's brief stint. His beloved Saints, from Talamo's hometown of New Orleans, won the Super Bowl. "Who dat say gonna beat them Saints?" Uh, no one.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - In a nondescript corner office of Barn 30 at the Thoroughbred Training Center, there isn't a single clue that its occupant trained the Kentucky Derby winner 40 years ago this May.

"I've only been in this barn a year or so," said Don Combs. "Maybe one day I'll hang up a picture or two."