ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - Cactus Ridge, one of the fastest 2-year-olds in the country, has returned to Arlington Park and is on course for a start in the Arlington-Washington Futurity here Sept. 27.

Sunday, Cactus Ridge won the $100,000 Ellis Park Juvenile by 6 1/2 lengths. His work in Henderson, Ky., done, Cactus Ridge boarded a horse van and rode back to Arlington on Sunday night.

"It was hot, and he was a little bit tired coming back," trainer Bret Calhoun said Thursday, "but he was raising hell again when we took him back to the track. He seems fine."

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. - On the scale of Beyer Speed Figures, no 2-year-old of 2001 ran faster than Cashel Castle. For winning the $102,000 Hoosier Juvenile in November of his 2-year-old year, Cashel Castle was given a towering 108 Beyer, a figure he backed up with two powerful wins to begin his 3-year-old campaign.

But no formula for measuring Cashel Castle's speed can predict how he'll run Saturday in the $100,000 Arlington Sprint. The race will be Cashel Castle's first start since April of 2002, and his first since suffering a leg injury that nearly ended his career.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Outside of the Malibu Stakes on Dec. 26 at Santa Anita, Saturday's $200,000 King's Bishop at Saratoga is the only other Grade 1 stakes remaining on this year's calendar for 3-year-olds.

Eager to take advantage of that opportunity are the connections of the 13 horses entered in the seven-furlong King's Bishop. The stellar field includes Amsterdam winner Zavata and Riva Ridge winner Posse. Eye of the Tiger and During, graded winners who are cutting back in distance, add intrigue to the race.

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - Trademark, the dominant, perfect-trip winner of the Bernard Baruch earlier in the meet, will need a similar performance against a stronger field to take Saturday's Grade 2, $200,000 Fourstardave Handicap, one of three supporting graded stakes on the Travers undercard.

His competition includes War Zone, who beat Trademark in the Poker at Belmont, as well as graded winners Quest Star, Patrol, Union Place, Tap the Admiral, Finality, Rouvres, Political Attack, and Rock Slide. Tam's Terms, the only non-graded winner in the field, is 6 for 6 on turf.

OCEANPORT, N.J. - Follow Me Home can accomplish a feat rarely achieved at Monmouth Park: four stakes victories by one horse in a summer meet.

Follow Me Home tries for a fifth win overall this meet as she tops the field in the $60,000 Miss Woodford Stakes for 3-year-old fillies at six furlongs Saturday.

The Miss Woodford and the $50,000 Decathlon Stakes are the supporting stakes on Iselin Day.

DEL MAR, Calif. - Valentine Dancer can jump-start the Del Mar meet for trainer Craig Lewis when she starts in Saturday's $75,000 Barona Cup Handicap.

Last year, Lewis finished in a tie for fifth in the trainers' standings with eight winners. This meet through Wednesday, he had just one victory from 25 starters.

"Nothing has been going our way this meet," Lewis said. "That's the way it goes. It will turn for us. We can't give up. We're just temporarily derailed."

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - When Eugene Melnyk came to the Saratoga yearling sales in 2001, he was intent on buying a son of Storm Cat out of the mare Gone to Venus.

Melnyk's trip was delayed, and he had to do his bidding from his private airplane. Every time the plane dropped below 15,000 feet, Melnyk would lose his cell-phone connection. Melnyk eventually lost out on the colt to bloodstock agent John Ferguson, who purchased him for $3.3 million for Godolphin Racing. The colt, Habayeb, now races for Darley Stud and has won just 1 of 5 starts and banked a paltry $17,635.

MIAMI - Hermans Honor moved to the top of the local filly and mare turf division last month with a pair of overnight stakes victories. On Saturday, she finally has the opportunity to compete for some big money in the $100,000 Aspidistra Handicap. The question is, will she get to run?

ALTOONA, Iowa - Passionate Bird goes for her fourth straight stakes win - all at different tracks - when she heads a field of eight fillies and mares in Saturday's $40,000 Iowa State Fair Stakes at Prairie Meadows.

MUSKEGON, Mich. - Heza Mountain Man, who won his maiden by a widening six lengths in his last start, heads a full field of 10 Michigan-bred juvenile colts and geldings in the $45,000 Little Ones Stakes on Saturday evening. The Little Ones is contested at 5 1/2 furlongs around two turns and will be the fifth of eight races on the card.

Heza Mountain Man is owned by John and Jan Buth and Marion Gorham and is trained by Bob Gorham, who is third in the local standings. Gorham will also saddle Rockem Sockem for his sister, Marion, in the Little Ones.