SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. - It looks like a game of copycat. With Anticipation and Denon just ran one-two in the United Nations Handicap at Monmouth Park on July 6. They came back and worked July 25 at Saratoga, with Denon going five furlongs, With Anticipation six. And on Wednesday morning at Saratoga, the two turf stars headed over at the same time to the main track, where, just after the renovation break, Denon worked a half-mile, With Anticipation five furlongs.

DEL MAR, Calif. - Mind for Gold was always going to start at Del Mar this weekend. If a $61,000 allowance race for fillies and mares on Friday had not filled, owners Frank and Sharon Alesia and trainer Peter Eurton were willing to put Mind for Gold in Sunday's $300,000 Clement Hirsch Handicap.

When the one-mile allowance race filled, they had found their race, and avoided a start against division leader Azeri on Sunday.

ETOBICOKE, Ontario - With Queen's Plate winner T J's Lucky Moon and Prince of Wales winner Le Cinquieme Essai both on the sidelines, Saturday's $500,000 Breeders' Stakes will provide an opportunity for a new runner to leave a winning impression on the Canadian Triple Crown trail.

The Breeders', the 1 1/2-mile turf race for Canadian-bred 3-year-olds that is the final leg of the Canadian Triple, has attracted a field of 10, headed by the Sam-Son Farm entry of Portcullis and Mountain Beacon.

EDMONTON, Alberta - The story of Friday's $40,000 Madamoiselle for older fillies and mares at Northlands Park is as much about who isn't in the race as it is about who is.

After a lengthy layoff, it had been expected that Alberta's 2001 champion older mare, Northern Neechitoo, would make her seasonal debut in the Madamoiselle.

But when entries were taken Monday, Northern Neechitoo was not among the seven entrants for the 1 1/16 mile feature.

AUBURN, Wash. - Whiskey Til Dawn has found a likely spot to score in Friday's featured race at Emerald Downs, a 6 1/2-furlong sprint for 3-year-old fillies eligible to be claimed for $32,000 or $25,000.

If you think the richest race in North America this weekend will be run at Saratoga or Del Mar, think again. Saturday's West Virginia Derby at Mountaineer Race Track tops all stakes with its $600,000 purse.

Mountaineer, which rests on the banks of the Ohio River in the sleepy town of Chester, W. Va., is offering a record purse for the 30th running of the West Virginia Derby. Two years ago, the West Virginia Derby's purse was half of what it is today.

COLLINSVILLE, Ill. - Two weeks after a horse infected with the West Nile virus was euthanized at Fairmount Park, two other horses on the grounds and another at an offtrack training facility in the area have been found to be infected with the virus.

DEL MAR, Calif. - Came Home, the winner of five stakes this year, will meet older horses for the first time, and top 3-year-old War Emblem, in the $1 million Pacific Classic at Del Mar on Aug. 25.

Came Home has not started since winning the Swaps Stakes over 1 1/8 miles at Hollywood Park on July 14. The Pacific Classic will be his first start at 1 1/4 miles since he finished sixth in the Kentucky Derby, losing by 10 1/4 lengths to War Emblem.

For the second straight year leading trainer Cole Norman has turned a former $25,000 claimer into a stakes winner in the Ark-La-Tex Handicap at Louisiana Downs, in Bossier City, La.

In 2001 he did it with Unrullah Bull, who after the Ark-La-Tex went on to win this year's Grade 3, $300,000 Texas Mile.

This year, Prince Iroquois turned the trick by winning Saturday's Ark-La-Tex, and as a result he will now be pointed to the Claiming Crown at Philadelphia Park on Aug. 31. His race, the $150,000 Jewel, is the richest of the six stakes that make up the Crown.

SAN MATEO, Calif. - Trainer John Anderson knows that there's not a high percentage in asking a horse to do too many new things at once.

So he is adding only one unknown into the equation when he brings Gyrene back to the races on Friday in the Bay Meadows Fair feature, a six-furlong allowance race for fillies and mares 3 years old and up.

The new part of the equation for the stakes-placed Gyrene, who won her maiden race in her last start at Pleasanton on July 6, is facing older horses for the first time.