Heavily favored Segesta begins three-race plan in Ballston Spa
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SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – Like a grandmaster in chess, trainer Chad Brown is already thinking several moves ahead with his multiple Grade 1 winner Segesta, who will go postward a heavy favorite Saturday at Saratoga in the $300,000 Ballston Spa. The Grade 2 Ballston Spa lured eight older fillies and mares to go 1 1/16 miles over the inner turf, including last year’s winner, Ozara.
Along with Segesta, Brown entered Grayosh and Play With Fire but said Play With Fire would scratch. Long Ago, who finished second to Grayosh last month in the Grade 3 Matchmaker at Monmouth Park, is cross-entered Saturday at Monmouth in the Violet Stakes.
Segesta closed her 2025 season winning the Grade 1 Matriarch at Del Mar and opened her current campaign 4 1/2 months later finishing in a dead heat for first with Expensive Queen in the Grade 1 Jenny Wiley. Her two most recent outings came locally, a third-place finish in the Grade 1 Just a Game and a second when run down late by stablemate Kathynmarissa going 1 1/8 miles in the Grade 1 Diana.
“She’s in good form now, so I decided to take a run in here to get her ready for the [Grade 1] First Lady at Keeneland and then maybe her final start in the Breeders’ Cup,” said Brown, who will be seeking a record ninth Ballston Spa victory. “That’s what I have lined up for her next three starts.”
Grayosh ran third in the Grade 3 Eatontown late this spring at Monmouth before returning on the same course five weeks later to register a one-length decision over Long Ago going nine furlongs in the Matchmaker. She will return to Saratoga for the first time since registering a neck decision over She Feels Pretty in the Grade 2 Lake Placid during the summer of 2024.
“She likes Saratoga, her best race is probably here when she beat She Feels Pretty a couple of years ago,” Brown said. “She’s coming off one, make that two, really good races down at Monmouth, so it’s time for her to step up.”
Ozara has won but once in five starts since defeating Dark Satin by 2 1/2 lengths in the 2025 Ballston Spa, although three of her setbacks during that period came in Grade 1 races, including the Diana. Ozara’s lone victory this season was in the listed Miss Liberty at Monmouth in her 2026 debut, which came at the direct expense of Long Ago.
Sunlit Uplands is the biggest question mark in the Ballston Spa. She will be making her U.S. debut for trainer Stuart Williams off a three-length victory going one mile over a yielding course in a Group 3 last month in Germany. She will be taking a jump in class for her local bow, She finished fourth in her only other previous try against graded stakes competition kicking off the year May 9 in England.
Williams is hoping Sunlit Uplands can replicate the success that several of his European-based counterparts have had here this summer, such as Kensington Lane in the Grade 1 Belmont Oaks, Title Role in the Grade 1 Belmont Derby, Glacius in the Grade 1 Sararoga Derby, and Survie, who captured both the Grade 1 Christophe Clement Turf and Grade 2 Glens Falls.
Long Ago will make the third start of her current form cycle while entering the race off big efforts in both the Miss Liberty and Matchmaker for trainer William Morey, who will run the daughter of Roaring Lion with blinkers for the first time on Saturday.
And One More Time figures to be a pace factor while stepping up in company off a wire-to-wire, 1 1/4-length triumph here July 17 in the restricted De La Rose Stakes. Deep Satin, a tiring sixth in the De La Rose when dropping out of a pair of Grade 1 tries earlier this year, completes the field.
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