Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies: Princess Secret tests positive for steroid, pulled from race
Princess Secret, a 2-year-old filly owned and trained by Daniel Pita, tested positive for an anabolic steroid in an out-of-competition sample pulled on Oct. 26 and will not be permitted to run in the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies at Keeneland Racecourse in Lexington on Friday, Breeders’ Cup announced on Monday.
Princess Secret, who won two stakes races restricted to Florida-breds at Gulfstream Park in August and September and has a career record of three wins and two seconds in five starts, tested positive for stanozolol, an anabolic steroid that is explicitly prohibited by Breeders’ Cup conditions of entry. The drug was confirmed in a split-sample test, Breeders’ Cup said.
Breeders’ Cup has a policy that bars any horse that tests positive for an anabolic steroid or any other “prohibited substance” in the six months leading up to the event. Prohibited substances are those that are not allowed to be present in a post-race test.
Pita said on Monday that “this filly has never been administered stanozolol in her life.” He said that Princess Secret has been under his care since she was bought in October 2019 out of a Florida yearling auction for $30,000, and that she has been in training at his barn at Gulfstream Park West since April.
“She has run all her own races and has done it on her own,” Pita said. “She’s earned the right to be in the race. We have been looking and searching for any way this filly could have been administered stanozolol and we have no idea how she was positive. This is not me. This is not how I run my business.”
As an out-of-competition test, Breeders’ Cup does not have any authority to penalize Pita beyond denying him the entry box. It could also ban Pita from future events.
"I understand the ruling, saying she can't run," Pita said. "I know this isn't a civil matter or racing commission matter. But it reflects badly on me and how I run my business."
Pita says that he was at his barn when inspectors drew the sample from Princess Secret on Oct. 26. He said he was told by Breeders’ Cup about the positive on Oct. 31, as he was readying to ship the filly north to Lexington.
Princess Secret was 30-1 on the morning line for the Juvenile Fillies, a race that drew eight pre-entries.
Breeders’ Cup has stepped up its out-of-competition testing efforts in recent years. Many drug-testing experts consider out-of-competition testing to be integral to anti-doping efforts.
Stanozolol is one of several anabolic steroids that racing worked to outlaw in the last decade due to the drug’s muscle-building effects. In 2016, the trainer Ron Ellis had a horse test positive for stanozolol after the Breeders’ Cup Sprint, and the horse was disqualified from second-place to last in the seven-horse field. Ellis contended that he advised veterinarians that he had given the drug outside of the recommended withdrawal time in order to help the horse put on weight.
Ellis was barred from entering a horse in the following year’s Breeders’ Cup, and Masochistic was also barred from participating in the event.