HORSE RACING : Bien Bien Gets 124, So Does Arcangues

Bien Bien and Arcangues, who will meet for the first time in the $500,000 Hollywood Turf Handicap on Monday, were each assigned 124 pounds for the 1 1/4-mile race.

Defending champion Bien Bien carried 122 against a suspect field and won the San Juan Capistrano Handicap on April 24 in his last start. Arcangues also carried 122 pounds while winning the John Henry Handicap on May 1 in his first start since winning the Breeders’ Cup Classic last Nov. 6.

“I think (Bien Bien) is one of the two most-accomplished turf horses in the world today,” said Arcangues’ trainer, Richard Mandella. “Arcangues might be there eventually, but right now I don’t know. He won only one Group 1 grass race in Europe, and Bien Bien has proven himself again and again.”

Only three others will probably run in the Grade I stake: Misil (119) and the Rodney Rash pair of Navarone (118) and Blues Traveller (114). Second to Arcangues in the John Henry, Misil worked five furlongs in 59 2/5 Wednesday, the best of 39 workouts at the distance.

Horse Racing Notes

Cancer, not a heart attack, killed Easy Goer, who collapsed and died outside his paddock at Claiborne Farm in Paris, Ky., on May 12. A necropsy done by T.W. Swerczek showed the malignancy had spread through the 8-year-old horse’s liver, lungs and intestinal membranes. . . . Johnny Mc, the gelding whose identity had been switched with Stalvoy’s for well over a month before the mistake was discovered a week ago, is entered in today’s fourth race, a six-furlong allowance event for California-breds. . . . A $12 wager landed an unidentified person the lone perfect ticket in Sunday’s Pick Six, worth $315,553.20. The bettor cashed the ticket at the Cabazon intertrack facility in Indio.