(July 17, 2008) - Saturday's 12th running of the $50,000 Bob Johnson Memorial Stakes for 3-year-olds and older, to be run at one mile over turf, has attracted a competitive field of nine.

The Chris Hartman-trained Tricky Causeway, who will be making his first start under the care of the Hartman barn, will be wearing the colors of owner Frontier Stables LLC for the first time. Purchased earlier this year out of a horse's of racing age sale at Keeneland, Tricky Causeway, who was previously trained by James Jerkens, enters the Bob Johnson off of a steady serious of long workouts.

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"We wanted to get a prep into him before the stakes, but he's been on a steady work pattern and he's fresh right now" added Hartman. "I'm just going to let Ken (Tohill) decide what to do with him out of the gate and he usually makes the right decision."

Two notables standing in the path of Tricky Causeway are the Nathan Wallis-trained Willow O Wisp, a multiple graded stakes winner over turf while racing primarily in Southern California, and the Steve Asmussen-conditioned Beta Capo, a multiple stakes winner in his own right. One of his four stakes wins was earned over the Lone Star Park turf course in the $60,000 Grand Prairie Turf Challenge in 2007.

The field from the rail out, with jockey and morning line odds listed in parenthesis, consists of: Willow O Wisp (Richard Eramia, 2-1); Ernesto (Justin Shepherd, 20-1); Beta Capo (Luis Quinonez, 9-5); Objective (Bobby Walker Jr., 20-1); Tricky Causeway (Ken Tohill, 5-2); Gold Wonder (Eddie Martin Jr., 10-1); Red Rock Creek (Luis Quinonez, 9-5); Etesaal (Martin Escobar, 5-2); and Waupaca (Quincy Hamilton, 8-1). Beta Capo and Red Rock Creek will run as an entry. There are two entries -- Tricky Causeway and Etasaal; and Beta Capo and Red Rock Creek.

Scheduled as race nine on the 11-race program, the Bob Johnson Memorial Stakes has an approximate post time of 5:19 P.M. CDT.