LOUISVILLE, Ky. – After months of flying all over the country to ride top prospects for the Kentucky Derby, jockey Javier Castellano has wound up right where he started, choosing to ride Audible, whom he rode to victory in the Holy Bull back in January, as Castellano tries to win the Derby for the first time in his highly decorated career.

ARCADIA, Calif. – Justify, the unbeaten early-line favorite for the Kentucky Derby, will ship to Churchill Downs in peak condition after a strong seven-furlong workout Friday at Santa Anita.

Working at 6:30 over a freshly renovated surface on a cool, overcast morning, Justify broke off at the 5 1/2-furlong marker, three to four lengths behind a workmate. Justify caught his rival at the finish, completed his seven-furlong drill on the clubhouse turn, and galloped out a mile. He did it easily.

Mahoning Valley Race Course in Ohio reported a record handle per race in statistics for its recently concluded winter-spring meeting.

Mahoning Valley reported gross handle of $65,358,215 during the 63-day meet and an average of $127,156 wagered per race, a spike of 24 percent from $102,873 per race for the 2017 winter-spring meet. The per-race average is a record for any meet held at Mahoning Valley since its 2014 opening.

The track also reported that field size grew, with an average of 8.12 wagering interests per race, compared to 7.78 for the 2017 meet.

ELMONT, N.Y. – The New York Racing Association plans a complete renovation of Belmont Park’s main track and two turf courses and is also looking at the possibility of adding a synthetic track as part of its plans to renovate the entire facility, Chris Kay, NYRA president and CEO, said on Wednesday.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – For the first time in four days, the main track was listed as fast at Churchill Downs, with the most noteworthy name on Thursday’s rather extensive work tab not that of a potential Kentucky Derby winner, but that of a past one.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Robert “Jim Bob” Douglas, who has worked every Kentucky Derby since 2000 as an assistant on the Churchill starting-gate crew, was on Gate 19 when I’ll Have Another won the 2012 Derby at 15-1 from that outer post.

“He’s been my only Derby winner so far,” said Douglas.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – Besides their Kentucky Derby horses, top trainers Bob Baffert, Chad Brown, and Todd Pletcher will be running some of their other stable stars at Churchill Downs next week in supporting stakes on the Kentucky Oaks (Friday) and Derby (Saturday) programs.

Here’s a quick rundown of next week’s stakes:

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The never-ending renovations that have turned Churchill Downs into a modern showplace will be unveiled for the racing public Saturday night when this historic track opens a 38-day spring meet amid the excitement building toward the May 5 Kentucky Derby.

ELMONT, N.Y. – In the age of modern technology, information is never more than a tap or a click away. So, as he sat in a corner of the clocker’s stand at the Belmont Park training track Thursday morning, trainer Kiaran McLaughlin was receiving timely updates from his brother Neal about the goings on at the Palm Meadows training center in South Florida.

That’s where McLaughlin’s 3-year-olds Enticed and Take Charge Paula put in their final workouts Thursday morning for the Kentucky Derby and Kentucky Oaks, respectively.

If the horse had been named Fish Cakes or Jabbering Jack, everything might be different.

“The curse of Fish Cakes” or “the curse of Jabbering Jack” – no one is saying that.

But no, his name was Apollo, and “the curse of Apollo,” well, that’s got a ring to it, and for decades now it’s been ringing through every Kentucky Derby that includes a starter who didn’t race at age 2.

Apollo, an unheralded underdog in the Derby of 1882, remains the only Derby winner who didn’t race as a 2-year-old. That is the factual part. “Curse” is just a matter of branding.