Grade 1 winner Abel Tasman flying under radar ahead of Santa Ysabel

ARCADIA, Calif. – It seems like all 3-year-old fillies not named Unique Bella have been forgotten in recent months in Southern California.

Abel Tasman fits that profile. She has not raced since winning the Grade 1 Starlet Stakes at Los Alamitos in December and will be overlooked to some extent in Saturday’s Grade 3 Santa Ysabel Stakes at Santa Anita. Unique Bella will be a heavy favorite in the $100,000 race at 1 1/16 miles.

“Running a Grade 1 winner in a Grade 3 for $100,000, it’s kind of strange that we’re not expected to win,” trainer Simon Callaghan said. “There is no pressure.

“It’s her first race back, and it’s a springboard to progress.”

Callaghan and owners Bernard and Eamonn Cleary consider Abel Tasman a prospect for the Grade 1 Kentucky Oaks at Churchill Downs on May 5. Getting there will require at least one encounter with Unique Bella, a two-time stakes winner for trainer Jerry Hollendorfer who is considered the favorite for the Kentucky Oaks.

“This race will tell us a lot,” Callaghan said of the Santa Ysabel. “We gave her time off by design. I think she’s improved from 2 to 3.”

Abel Tasman, by Quality Road, has won 3 of 4 starts. After finishing fifth in her debut at Del Mar in August, she won a maiden race at a mile at Santa Anita in late September, an allowance race at seven furlongs at Del Mar in November, and the Starlet Stakes at 1 1/16 miles on Dec. 10.

In the Starlet, Abel Tasman was a 12-1 shot in a field of nine. She closed from seventh under jockey Joe Talamo to take the lead in the final sixteenth, winning by a length over American Gal.

“Going into that race, I knew she’d be right there,” Callaghan said. “I really felt she was improving.

“I knew that stamina is one of her assets. I knew the long stretch would suit her and she’d keep running. She proved that. She was almost eased down by the wire.”

Bernard and Eamonn Cleary bred Abel Tasman through their Kentucky-based Clearsky Farms, which has had tremendous success in recent years. Clearsky Farms is the breeder of Arrogate, the world’s top-ranked horse, as well as the graded stakes winners Firing Line, Lord Nelson, and Mohaymen.

Firing Line, trained by Callaghan, was second in the 2015 Kentucky Derby. Lord Nelson won three Grade 1 sprints last year. Mohaymen won two Grade 2 races and was fourth in the Kentucky Derby last year.

All of those runners were sold as weanlings or yearlings by Clearsky. Mohaymen was purchased for $2.2 million at the 2014 Keeneland September yearling sale, tying for the highest price of the auction.

By comparison, Abel Tasman did not meet her reserve at the 2015 Keeneland September sale.

“We’re a commercial breeding operation, so we pretty much bring all our yearlings to the sales,” Bernard Cleary said in an e-mail last weekend. “She didn’t reach her reserve, which was $70,000. When we couldn’t get that, we thought we’d take a chance with her, and it’s worked out pretty good.”

Abel Tasman has earned $247,680. For Clearsky Farms, her win in the Starlet was part of a string of major successes in consecutive months. Arrogate won the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic at Santa Anita in November and the $12 million Pegasus World Cup at Gulfstream Park in January.

“Last year was very exciting,” Cleary said. “There were a couple of times throughout the year when we thought it couldn’t really get any better, and yet it did. We’re really appreciative of the year we had as breeders because years like that don’t come about too often.”

An upset win Saturday would add to those achievements – and put Abel Tasman at the fore of the nation’s 3-year-old fillies.