Mo d'Amour could land a return to Oaks for Stanco

OZONE PARK, N.Y. – A few months ago, somebody at a dinner asked owner Ed Stanco if the morning after Princess of Sylmar won the 2013 Kentucky Oaks at Churchill Downs did he wake up and think, ‘My God, you won the Oaks?’ ”

“I said, ‘I got to tell you something,’ ” Stanco recalled Wednesday morning. “I wake up every morning three years later and say, ‘We won the Oaks.’ ”

On her way to upsetting the Kentucky Oaks at 38-1, Princess of Sylmar won the Busanda and Busher stakes over Aqueduct’s inner track. On Saturday, the Busher will be run for the 37th time, and Stanco will be back in it with the filly Mo d’Amour. The top four finishers in the $125,000 Busher earn qualifying points to the Kentucky Oaks on a 50-20-10-5 basis. A win or second in the Busher could earn Mo d’Amour a spot in the Oaks on May 6.

“It would almost be overwhelming to me to think that that could happen,” Stanco said. “But she’s a nice filly, she really is.”

Mo d’Amour has some improving to do before she could be considered on the level of Princess of Sylmar, who on Feb. 12 in Japan gave birth to a colt by Deep Impact. A daughter of Uncle Mo, Mo d’Amour is 2 for 4 with a maiden win sprinting at Aqueduct last November and a one-mile optional-claiming win at Laurel three weeks ago sandwiching two double-digit-length defeats in stakes.

Mo d’Amour, trained by Todd Pletcher, finished last of seven in the Grade 2 Demoiselle, but that race came just 13 days after her maiden win. Coming off a near two-month freshening, Mo d’Amour finished third, beaten 10 1/2 lengths, to the heavily favored Constellation in the four-horse Ruthless Stakes going six furlongs.

“She ran into a buzz saw, which we knew that filly was really good,” Stanco said of Constellation. “[Mo d’Amour] got her black type and we went to the race at Laurel, and that was a nice effort on her part.”

Mo d’Amour was a stalking presence in her optional-claiming race at Laurel before opening up in the stretch. She did switch back to her left lead in deep stretch and ran a mile in a modest 1:40.20. She will have to improve dramatically to be competitive in graded stakes, but she will likely be second or third choice in Saturday’s Busher behind Flora Dora.

Mo d’Amour, who will be ridden by Chris DeCarlo from post 5 in the Busher, had a solid half-mile workout in 47.72 last Saturday over the Belmont Park training track. She worked in company with Lost Raven, another Pletcher-trained filly entered in the Busher, and the pair came home in 22.89 seconds.

The field for the Busher, in post order, is Lost Raven, Katniss the Victor, Dreams to Reality, Arch Or Nothing, Mo d’Amour, Whistling Straits, and Flora Dora.