(October 24, 2004)- Storm Flag Flying, a past Breeders' Cup champion and one of the top choices for Saturday's $2 million Breeders' Cup Distaff - Presented by Nextel, checked into the Lone Star Park stable area at 2:41 p.m. CT Sunday after a flight from New York. The 4-year-old multiple Grade I winner was one of eight Breeders' Cup World Thoroughbred Championships contenders to arrive in Dallas aboard the H. E. Tex Sutton Forwarding Co. charter plane.

Crisanto Maldonado, the groom for Storm Flag Flying, reported that she traveled fine and everything was in good order.

Mr O'Brien, the Pimlico-based Kelso Breeders' Cup Handicap winner pointing to the $1.5 million NetJets Breeders' Cup Mile, was behaving cantankerously while trainer Robin Graham grazed him behind Barn B3. The 5-year-old gelding was bucking and rearing between mouthfuls of grass.

"Obviously the van ride didn't knock him out," cracked Graham as she scolded the menace from Maryland. "He's just playing, really. He's upset because back home [in the Eastern time zone] it's ten minutes of six [o'clock] and he thinks he missed his dinner. He's more interested in eating than anything else."

One barn south in B2, the Jerkens horses - father Allen Jerkens' Metropolitan Handicap runner-up Bowman's Band (pointing to the $4 million Breeders' Cup Classic - Powered by Dodge) and multiple Saratoga Grade I winner Society Selection (Distaff) plus son Jimmy Jerkens' 3-year-old sensation Artie Schiller (Mile) - were resting comfortably in their stalls.

"They all looked like they shipped in fine," Jimmy Jerkens said. "We're going to the track in the morning but we're undecided about what time because my dad and I are using the same exercise rider [teenage apprentice Shannon Uske] so we have to figure that out."

Also aboard the flight from New York, which stopped in Kentucky, were Mazarine Breeders' Cup Stakes winner Higher World ($1 million Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies) and Philadelphia Park stakes winner Abbondanza ($1 million Breeders' Cup Sprint), as well as Lone Star stakes possibles Cut And Shoot (Friday's Lone Star Derby) and Savorthetime (Saturday's Honeysuckle Rose).