Bill of Fair : Entertainment: The San Fernando Valley tradition opens a four-day run. Racing piglets are among the event’s most popular offerings.

Psssst , here’s a tip: Put your bacon on Sourdough Jack, in the green silks. He could take it by two links, er, lengths. But in the unlikely event of showers, Rainy, in the blue, eats up a muddy track. Kobuk, in yellow, is a long shot at 16-1.

Not to condone gambling at the San Fernando Valley Fair. That would be illegal.

But the most popular event at the fair, which opens today at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center in Burbank and runs through Sunday, features racing piglets, along with a vaudeville of other pigs of varied talents.

The fair, with its bake-offs, livestock competitions, rodeo, two-stepping lessons, singles square dance and twangy country-Western entertainment, is a throwback to the Valley’s rural past, before studio expansions, suburban sprawl and drive-by shootings became a way of life.

“It’s clean, wholesome family entertainment,” General Manager Dale Coons said.

But bringing clean, wholesome family entertainment to the masses has had its ups and downs. A few years ago, the fair ran up a $200,000 deficit.

It moved several times. There was a hiatus during the late 1970s and early 1980s when it wasn’t held at all.

It looked like the fair would turn things around last year, its first at the equestrian center. But storms dampened the event, and only about 35,000 people showed up. Organizers were expecting 50,000.

But 1993, with its distinctive motto--”Four Days of Yahoos”--is the year the fair will go back into the black, Coons predicts. Private sponsors have helped, and if the anticipated 60,000 people show up this weekend, fair officials can continue to charge admission of only $5.

If not, Coons said, officials might have to consider charging extra fees for entertainment and the rodeo.

This year’s fair is a regular pigfest.

The world’s fattest pig, weighing in at an amazing half a ton, is here. So are what must be some of the world’s swiftest pigs, the racers that run every 20 minutes. And then there’s the Valley’s best pig, a 201-pound porker named Gunland’s Pride, who on Wednesday won the blue ribbon for 15-year-old Eric Avalos of Mission Hills as the best of show.

Just three weeks ago, Gunland’s Pride--known as Gun for short--was a long shot herself. She was feeling poorly, not gaining much weight. It didn’t look like she’d hit the 190-pound minimum.

What a difference a little TLC makes. Avalos, a member of the Country Bumpkins 4-H Club of Sylmar, pampered Gun like a princess. He fanned her, hosed her and cooked up heaping helpings of cracked corn in his crock pot. He laced her feed with Karo syrup.

Life was good. Gun packed on 30 pounds in no time and now tips the scales at a hefty 201.

Do not mistake this pampering for bonding. Avalos is a realist. He knows that one of these days, Gun’s going to be someone’s supper. Probably a lot of someones.

“It’s not a pet,” he said. And he knows the judges’ eyes are equally calculating. Gun won, he said, “because it had the kind of carcass--ah, the type of pig build--the judge liked.”

In contrast, the racing piglets are lean and mean and have a longer life expectancy.

But life on the road can be grueling. The strange towns. The late nights. The fans. The hours of idle time while trainer Sean Boswell, 22, sets up the track. There isn’t much to do, Boswell said, except kick back and enjoy a “swine cooler.”

Owner Bart Noll of Olympia, Wash., said the piglets race until they are about 6 months old. Then, he said, they take early retirement at his farm, the original “Club Mud.”

For gamblers--in Las Vegas, say, where this is probably legal--the morning line on the fleet-trottered piglets would be:

Soapy Smith, in the gray, 8-1. A slippery character who can’t be counted on.

Sourdough Jack, green, 5-3. A chauvinist pig. Aggressive.

Kobuk, yellow, 16-1. The long shot.

Yukon, red, 25-1. Big and slow. A washout.

Strawberry, pink, 3-1. Sweet-named porker can pull it out.

Rainy, blue, 5-1. Likes the mud.

Ellie Mae, black, 8-1. A porcine princess, this critter can run.

Jethro, purple, 4-1. Likes his grits.

*FAIR THEE WELL

A complete list of things for the family to do today at the fair. B2