Breeders' Cup Distaff: Wow Cat upping her U.S. game

Wow Cat scored a breakthrough 3 3/4-length victory in the Grade 1 Beldame Stakes last Saturday at Belmont Park. With that automatic qualifier in her pocket, the Chilean champion is poised to add some intrigue to the Breeders’ Cup Distaff as she heads to Kentucky by way of New York.

“It’s taken some time to acclimatize,” said Peter Brant, who owns Wow Cat with Stud Vendaval. “She’s been here six months, and we’ve found that’s when they usually start doing better.”

Wow Cat, a 4-year-old daughter of Coolmore shuttle sire Lookin At Lucky, won all eight starts in her native Chile by a combined 47 3/4 lengths, with those coming at distances ranging from 6 1/2 furlongs up to about 1 3/8 miles. Her four Group 1 victories included a sweep of the Chilean Triple Crown, making her the only filly to win that series. Following that 2017 season, Brant purchased an interest in the filly and brought her to the U.S. to place her with Brown. She logged her first breeze for him in May.

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Wow Cat made her U.S. debut in the Grade 3 Shuvee Stakes on July 29 at Saratoga, finishing second, just a neck shy of multiple graded stakes winner Farrell despite being bumped at the start. She came back in the Grade 1 Personal Ensign on Aug. 25 and finished third, 9 3/4 lengths behind champion Abel Tasman and multiple Grade 1 winner Elate.

Off those efforts, Wow Cat was sent away favored in the Beldame, and delivered. The filly tracked the pace in midpack, pounced to take the lead around the far turn while still in hand, and continued to widen her advantage.

“It takes your breath away just looking at her, physically,” Brown said. “We can’t take any credit for the way she looks; she arrived this way. It took a while for her to acclimate. She was training really well heading into Saratoga. Not only did some extra time help her, I don’t think she really cared that much for Saratoga, in hindsight. She never trained great once I got her up there. She trained okay. She got beat 10 lengths [in the Personal Ensign] by two really good fillies, but I didn’t think the gap should be 10 lengths. She’s really a top-class horse. She came to us undefeated. She’s legit.”

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The other automatic qualifier for the Distaff last weekend also belonged to a Southern Hemisphere-born mare who was scoring her first American Grade 1 win. Blue Prize, a multiple graded stakes winner at Breeders’ Cup host track Churchill Downs, posted a three-quarter length victory over Champagne Problems in the Grade 1 Spinister Stakes at Keeneland, despite drifting out dramatically in the stretch. Those same two were one-two in the Grade 3 Locust Grove Stakes last month at Churchill.