Golden Actor will have a Hall of Fame rider on his team Saturday when he runs in the Grade 3, $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot. But the retired Jose Santos won’t be making his comeback on the horse. He has instead been serving as an adviser to owner Jaime Mejia, who races Golden Actor under the nom de course Thoroughbred Champion Training Center.

The fields for Zia Park’s most prestigious races were drawn Wednesday, and Southern California invaders Jojo Warrior and Tonito M., are expected to start as the respective favorites in the $300,000 Zia Park Oaks and $200,000 Zia Park Derby when the races are run Nov. 26.

Unlike last year, when the Clark Handicap was a factor in Eclipse Awards voting, the Grade 1 race does not figure to have any championship ramifications when it is run next Friday (Nov. 28) fat Churchill Downs for the 141st time.

Trainer Bob Baffert confirmed Wednesday that he intends to send Hoppertunity for the $500,000 Clark. Hoppertunity, most recently a fast-closing second in an Oct. 29 allowance at Santa Anita, will be ridden by Rafael Bejarano when stretching out to 1 1/8 miles in the Clark.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Well Measured has shown he can fire fresh – witness his victory first time out back in January at Santa Anita. But when he returns from a 7 1/2-month layoff in the third race Friday, he “might be short,” warned his trainer, Peter Miller.

“I had wanted to run him in a five-eighths race, but he didn’t get in,” Miller said Wednesday morning. “This was the second choice.”

The third race is at seven furlongs. Well Measured drew the rail.

MIAMI – Trainer Graham Motion had plenty of options to choose from when it came to the only two graded stakes at this year’s inaugural Gulfstream Park West meet, Saturday’s Grade 3 Tropical Turf and My Charmer handicaps. Motion nominated four horses to both events.

In the end, he opted to enter Edge of Reality and Rapscallion in the Tropical Turf and only Magic of Reality for the My Charmer.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The rare case of a frozen track at Churchill Downs had horsemen and fans wondering when racing would resume in the aftermath of a Wednesday cancellation and the distinct possibility of more cancelled days.

DEL MAR, Calif. – Starting with Stars Above Me in the featured seventh race here Friday and continuing right through Thanksgiving weekend, trainer Graham Motion will have plenty of action at Del Mar.

Santa Anita has raised the purses of two leading stakes for older horses – the Santa Anita Handicap and San Antonio Stakes – but eliminated the Strub Stakes for 4-year-olds for the track’s upcoming winter-spring meeting, which runs from Dec. 26 to April 19.

The Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap on March 7 will be worth $1 million, an increase of $250,000 from 2014. The Santa Anita Handicap, run at 1 1/4 miles on dirt, offered a purse of $1 million from 1986 to 2009.

The Grade 3, $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot and Grade 3, $400,000 Delta Downs Princess both drew overflow fields on Tuesday, when entries were taken for the Saturday features. The route races for 2-year-olds anchor a card of eight stakes worth $2.3 million. Trainer D. Wayne Lukas has the morning-line favorites for both stakes, with Mr. Z installed the track’s 5-2 choice in the Jackpot and Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies winner Take Charge Brandi made 2-1 for the Princess.

Wake Up Nick will find himself in an unfamiliar situation on Saturday when he starts in the Grade 3, $1 million Delta Downs Jackpot. He will be looking to get back into the win column after suffering his first loss in six career starts earlier this month at Santa Anita.

Wake Up Nick ran second in the $196,000 Golden State Juvenile on the Breeders’ Cup undercard Nov. 1. He was beaten
1 1/4 lengths after having to go around horses when unable to advance along the inside at a key point in the race, said his trainer, Leandro Mora.