G R Carter

The world's most prestigious race for older quarter horses will take place Saturday night at Los Alamitos when a field of 10, headed by Heisajoy, will compete in the $250,000 Champion of Champions XIX. The Grade I event is an invitational race matching the top quarter horses from across the country at 440 yards.

The record for stakes victories by a trainer at a Santa Anita winter-spring meet is 16, established by Bob Baffert in 1998-99. The way Bobby Frankel has begun the current season, the record is in serious jeopardy and could be broken long before Santa Anita wraps up April 22. With more than 75% of the meet remaining, Frankel already has five stakes wins and has a chance to add to his total this weekend.

Bruce Pilkenton winced when he climbed off Refrigerator after Saturday's Los Alamitos Championship. Refrigerator's victory had only momentarily dulled the pain of a shoulder injury Pilkenton suffered in a Friday night spill. But for all the pain, he at least had a victory to show for it. Refrigerator was Pilkenton's only mount Saturday night after the spill in Friday's $20,000 Katella Handicap had sent him to the hospital with a slight tear of a shoulder ligament. Two other riders, G.R.

L. Wayne Gertmenian's tumultuous term as president and chief executive of the Jockeys' Guild ended Tuesday when the organization's reconstituted board of directors fired him and his consulting company. Gertmenian, an economics professor at Pepperdine University recommended by jockey Chris McCarron before the guild hired him in 2001, lost face after a congressional subcommittee severely criticized him during a hearing in Washington last month.

Kentucky Derby winner Street Sense put on a first-rate performance, pulling away in the stretch and winning the $500,000 Jim Dandy Stakes on Sunday at Saratoga Race Course at Saratoga Springs, N.Y. In his first race since finishing second in the Preakness Stakes more than two months ago, Street Sense had more than enough in reserve to overtake C P West in the stretch for a 1 1/2 -length victory.

Heath Taylor, 24, could pass for any other successful member of Generation X. He earned a college degree, started a good job right out of school and is planning a spring wedding. But you won't find Taylor behind a desk. He is more comfortable in the barn area at Los Alamitos, where he has accomplished something few people of any generation can boast about.

It could be a weekend like no other for Corona Cash. The 2-year-old filly could win Los Alamitos' richest race and also lock up the world championship, which is quarter horse racing's version of horse of the year. Winning the race, tonight's $1,186,310 Los Angeles Million Futurity, may be easier for Corona Cash than winning the election.

Fred Kuebler was a student at San Fernando Valley State College and didn't have a clue what he was getting into one day in 1968 when he walked his teenage brother over to the horse stables at the old Devonshire Downs in Northridge. Rick Kuebler, 14, had developed a fascination with harness racing and yearned to be a race driver.

Thirty years ago, trainer Dan Francisco won the Champion of Champions quarter horse race at Los Alamitos with Don Guerro, a horse owned by actor Robert Mitchum. Mitchum, who died in 1997, was ill and unable to watch Don Guerro's win, Francisco recalled. "He was happy when I called him that night to tell him he had won," Francisco said, "but the main thing he wanted to know was what the horse paid. He had made a nice bet on his horse."

The night more than two years ago, when Runahalf ran for a $10,000 claiming price, several trainers were seen tearing up their claim slips after they had seen the horse close-up in the Los Alamitos paddock. "They saw that this horse could hardly see in his left eye," trainer Juan G. Aleman said. Still, Aleman thought Runahalf might be a good buy at the price, and two other trainers did too.