Abel Tasman targets Ogden Phipps Stakes

What’s better than having one Kentucky Oaks winner on a card? Having two.

Monomoy Girl, the winner of this year’s Oaks, already was ticketed for the Grade 1, $700,000 Acorn Stakes for 3-year-old fillies on the Belmont Stakes card on June 9, and now Abel Tasman also will be part of that sensational day of racing, as she will head to Belmont Park for the Grade 1, $750,000 Ogden Phipps for older females, trainer Bob Baffert said.

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Abel Tasman, last year’s champion 3-year-old filly, was fourth in the Grade 1 La Troienne Stakes at Churchill Downs earlier this month in her first start of the year, but she returned to Santa Anita after that and worked five furlongs in a sharp 59.40 seconds on Monday, the best time of 44 at the distance.

“She worked great,” Baffert said. “She needed that last race.”

This will be Abel Tasman’s first start at Belmont Park since she won last year’s Acorn during a win streak preceded by the Kentucky Oaks and including the Coaching Club American Oaks at Saratoga.