Gamine's next dance: Ballerina Stakes at Saratoga
DEL MAR, Calif. – Gamine, the champion female sprinter of 2020, will start in the Grade 1 Ballerina Stakes for fillies and mares at Saratoga on Aug. 28, trainer Bob Baffert said on Sunday.
The $500,000 Ballerina Stakes is run at seven furlongs and will be the fourth start of the year for Gamine, who has won her last four races beginning with the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint at Keeneland last year.
Earlier this season, Gamine won the Grade 3 Las Flores Stakes at Santa Anita in April, the Grade 1 Derby City Distaff at Churchill Downs on May 1, and the Grade 2 Great Lady M. Stakes at Los Alamitos on July 5.
Sunday’s workout was the second for Gamine since the Great Lady M. Stakes. A 4-year-old filly, Gamine has won 8 of 9 starts. She is owned by Michael Petersen.
Earlier this month, a New York District Court judge gave Baffert a stay on a ban issued in May by the New York Racing Association that prohibited the Hall of Fame trainer from starting horses at its tracks in the aftermath of a positive test found in Kentucky Derby winner Medina Spirit for the anti-inflammatory betamethasone.