• Presque Isle meet begins Friday•
Live Thoroughbred racing will return to the Erie, Pennsylvania, area on Friday when Presque Isle Downs begins its 2008 meeting.
Presque Isle’s 100-day season will extend through September 27, with a daily post time of 5:30 p.m. EDT. Admission and general parking throughout the meet will be free.
Last year, Presque Isle’s inaugural meeting was 25 days and generated averages of 2,851 in daily attendance, $58,257 in daily on-track wagering and $585,680 in daily wagering from all sources. It was the first pari-mutuel meeting held in the Erie area since Commodore Downs ceased operations two decades ago.
“We’ve got the money, we’ve got the surface, and I anticipate a very good meet here,” said David Frizzell, racing secretary at Presque Isle. Frizzell anticipates an average purse distribution of around $180,000 per race card. Races will be conducted over Presque Isle’s one-mile oval, which has a synthetic Tapeta Footings surface.
The Presque Isle race program will be anchored by 25 stakes races, 13 of which will be open events, and the remaining 12 restricted to horses sired and/or bred in Pennsylvania.
Highlighting the stakes program will be the second running of the $400,000 Presque Isle Downs Masters Stakes, a six-furlong race for fillies and mares, three years old and upwards, on September 13.
Opening day at Presque Isle will include the second running of the $100,000 Inaugural Stakes. Among the expected participants in the Inaugural Stakes, a six-furlong race for three-year-old fillies, is American County, who is trained by Dale Romans.
American County won the Sunshine Million Oaks at Gulfstream Park on January 26. At age two, Sunshine County finished third in the Debutante Stakes (G3) at Churchill Downs.
Steve Asmussen, who conditions the 2007 Horse the Year, Curlin, and who led all North American trainers in ’07 with 488 victories, plans to maintain a 40-horse string this season at Presque Isle. Last year, Asmussen registered ten wins and 36 placings at Presque Isle to lead the trainer standings by purse earnings with $847,975.

• Few horses to take on Big Brown in Preakness•
The flight to Baltimore may be a lonely one for Big Brown in the wake of his dominating victory in Saturday’s Kentucky Derby.
As of Sunday morning, it appeared Big Brown would be the only member of the Derby field heading to Pimlico for the Preakness on May 17. Among the connections of horses who finished behind Big Brown in the Derby, only trainer Louie Roussel left the door open, saying he was leaning against bringing Recapturetheglory to the Preakness but that he wouldn’t make a decision until Monday.
Recapturetheglory finished fifth, nearly a dozen lengths behind Big Brown, after challenging for the lead around the second turn in the Derby.
The connections of the remainder of the Derby field indicated they would either give their horses some time off or await the Belmont in five weeks for another potential meeting with Big Brown.
Big Brown looked a picture of health as he walked the shedrow in Barn 22 at Churchill Downs on Sunday morning. Trainer Rick Dutrow Jr. said the undefeated and as yet still untested Big Brown came out of his 4 3/4-ength victory over the ill-fated filly, Eight Belles, in good order and that he would remain at Churchill Downs until May 14 before shipping to Maryland.
Among the 3-year-olds expected to be waiting for the Derby winner in the Preakness are Kentucky Bear and El Gato Malo, both of whom were excluded from the Derby lineup due to insufficient graded earnings.
Trainer Larry Jones was at his barn at Churchill Downs and addressed a handful of reporters about the tragedy that claimed the life of the filly Eight Belles moments after she crossed the finish line second in the Derby. Jones, who trained Eight Belles, reiterated his comments of the night before that he did not believe the racing surface was in any way responsible for her injury -- she broke her front ankles while galloping out -- and said he felt sorry for the connections of the Derby winner considering that much of the attention that would normally have been focused on them was shifted to Eight Belles and Jones immediately after the race.