Oaklawn Park: Sugar Shock headed to Churchill Downs for Kentucky Oaks

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Plans are being made to send Sugar Shock, the winner of Saturday’s Grade 3, $400,000 Fantasy Stakes at Oaklawn Park, to Churchill Downs for the Kentucky Oaks, trainer Doug Anderson said Monday. Sugar Shock was a half-length winner of the Fantasy, wiring the field from her rail post and earning a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 92.

“She came out of the race just super,” Anderson said Monday. “She cleaned up everything that night and, the next morning, acted like she really hadn’t done anything. She was more or less back to her normal self. She really is a laid-back filly around the barn. She’s as laid-back as can be, but once you get her on the track, she’s all business.”

Anderson was working on shipping plans Monday. He has a 30-horse stable that will be based at Prairie Meadows after the Oaklawn meet ends Saturday, but Sugar Shock will go straight to Churchill to prep for the May 2 Oaks.

“Right now, I think she’ll have one real good work because she’s run hard, and with the shipping and everything, that’s what our plan is right now,” Anderson said. “That could change.”

Sugar Shock, who last year debuted at Churchill, has come to hand during the Oaklawn meet. She won a maiden special weight sprint Jan. 20, then dominated a first-level allowance sprint Feb. 13. Sugar Shock made her stakes and two-turn debuts in the Grade 3, $150,000 Honeybee Stakes on March 8, and while she finished first by a neck, she was disqualified for impeding a rival in the stretch. One start later, Sugar Shock won the Fantasy Stakes.

“That’s my first graded stakes win,” said Anderson, a 58-year-old Nebraska native who began training out of high school. “You might say the other one, but she was disqualified. It’s the first time I was ever disqualified in my training career.”

But it all worked out in the end, Anderson said.

“It’s kind of hard to explain,” he said. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime moment right now.”

Anderson said Channing Hill has the mount in the Kentucky Oaks. Sugar Shock, a daughter of Candy Ride, was a $20,000 yearling purchase at Keeneland in September 2012. She races for the On Cloud Nine partnership of Anderson, Warren Bush, Jim Coulter, and Aaron Kennedy. Anderson said the stable name reflects the state of mind in which Sugar Shock has placed her partners.