Lush Lips, Expensive Queen give Walsh a strong hand in First Lady

Trainer Chad Brown won every renewal of the First Lady Stakes race from 2018-24. He ran first and second in 2021, 2022, and 2023, and in 2024 saddled the trifecta. His First Lady streak ended last year when Segesta finished second by a neck and Dynamic Pricing a seventh, and in Saturday’s renewal of the First Lady, Segesta carries Brown’s lone hope.

Instead, it’s trainer Brendan Walsh with two live horses. Lush Lips should improve massively from a surprising defeat returning in August from a long layoff, while Expensive Queen last saw racing action dead-heating for first with Segesta in the Grade 1 Jenny Wiley last April at Keeneland.

The Grade 1, $800,000 First Lady, contested over one mile, drew nine entrants.

Even before Lush Lips came back from an eighth-month layoff Aug. 23 in the $152,000 Ellis Park Turf, her connections eyed the First Lady and the BC Filly and Mare Turf. Those are the sorts of races one sets as a goal after spending $3.7 million to buy a horse, as William and Donna Shively’s Dixiana Farm did with Lush Lips in November.

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Lush Lips, improving throughout her 3-year-old campaign, finished a tough-luck second in the Del Mar Oaks before posting a comfortable 1 1/2-length victory at Keeneland in the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup in October, the performance that produced her boxcars sale price.

A sharp winner of her 4-year-old debut, the Honey Fox on Feb. 28 at Gulfstream, Lush Lips was set to start as the favorite in the Jenny Wiley when she came up with an injury Walsh hoped would prove minor. Instead, it took until late summer to get Lush Lips back racing, and after taking a clear lead to the stretch call as the 1-2 favorite at Ellis, Lush Lips was run down by an inferior rival.

“She did get stouter through the year having the time off, and I think she needed the race at Ellis a lot more than I realized,” Walsh said. “Since then, she went back to where she was last year. Her work was more aggressive, and the last two or three works have been what we were getting out of her before.”

Even with Lush Lips out, Walsh still won the Jenny Wiley – kind of. Expensive Queen, a fast-rising 5-year-old Irish import made a big move up the fence, and in one more stride would have won the Jenny Wiley outright. Instead, Segesta got a favorable bob and a tie, while Expensive Queen after the race got an injury layoff about as long as Lush Lips’s.

“She’s been much easier to get ready; I don’t think she’ll need a race,” Walsh said. “She improved immensely last year, and going by her work, I think she might have improved again.”

Segesta had been rock solid for more than a year, never finishing worse than third, until she finished fifth with no apparent excuse as the 4-5 favorite Aug. 22 in the Ballston Spa. That was a bridge race getting Segesta from her summer campaign to the First Lady, and Brown said Segesta looks good and has trained forwardly.

Trainer Mark Casse sends out two horses with the same front-running style: Classic Q, winner of the Grade 1 Just a Game in June, and And One More Time, front-running winner of the Ballston Spa.

“It’s possible they could go head-to-head,” Casse conceded.

Classic Q didn’t race between the Just a Game on June 6 and the Ladies Turf on Sept. 5 at Kentucky Downs, where she came home a tame third as the favorite.

“Classic Q was really good first part of Saratoga, a little flat the latter part, but I think right now she’s in a very good spot,” Casse said. “And One More Time, she’s a happy camper, the best I’ve seen her in a few months.”

Mandanaba finished 1 1/2 lengths behind Classic Q in the Just a Game, went home to France, and was second behind the unaccomplished German horse Loucas racing Sept. 6 at Baden-Baden. Deep Satin can rally for a share. Bless the Broken, winner of a rich Kentucky Downs race in her turf debut, drew poorly on the far outside. Call it Walsh over Brown in this First Lady.

TCA Stakes

The Eclatant who won the Grade 1 Madison Stakes in April at Keeneland would roll home Saturday in the Grade 2, $400,000 Thoroughbred Club of America Stakes. The Eclatant who raced Aug. 29 at Saratoga would get rolled in the TCA.

Eclatant had Grade 3-level form at best through June of her 3-year-old season but returned this past February from an eight-month layoff a different horse. Her allowance comeback at Gulfstream produced a 104 Beyer Speed Figure, and Eclatant got a 103 defeating the high-class mare Grand Job by a nose in the Madison.

Back June 20, Eclatant, the 7-10 favorite, had to work surprisingly hard to narrowly win the Grade 2 Chicago Stakes on June 20 at Churchill. Her effort in the Grade 1 Ballerina five weeks ago at Saratoga was non-existent: The mare never came close to contention and lost by more than 26 lengths.

“No excuse other than it didn’t go well,” trainer Brad Cox said. “It was not a pretty sight going into the far turn. She didn’t offer any run that day. She’s put in a couple nice works since then, she likes Keeneland, and hopefully we can get her back to where she was before.”

The seven-horse, six-furlong TCA drew a modest field of seven, and Echo Sound looks like the right horse. She, too, ran in the Ballerina, and despite a difficult inside trip just behind the speed, Echo Sound ran on gamely for a decent fourth behind standout winner Ways and Means. A one-furlong cutback helps her, and Echo Sound has a good outside draw from which to deploy her speed.

The TCA offers its winner a fees-paid berth in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint.

Woodford Stakes

Doncho has an ideal outside post to get a perfect trip pressing pacesetting Joe Shiesty in the Grade 2, $400,000 Woodford Stakes, a 5 1/2-furlong turf race. The 4-year-old, who showed plenty of dirt ability early in his career, has learned to harness his speed, has excellent turf form this year, and now trains daily like a focused, professional horse, according to trainer Michelle Lovell.

What’s not to like? Doncho has run twice on the Keeneland turf – and run poorly twice. Not to worry, Lovell said.

“He had excuses for both those races,” she said.

Doncho, in fact, came out of his seventh in the 2025 Woodward with a torn shoulder muscle that required significant time off. Irad Ortiz Jr. rides him for the first time, and with no other speed entered in the Woodford, Joe Shiesty and Doncho should have the best of things.

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