Queen Bridget drops out of stakes company for second start of the year

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Queen Bridget put a few Kentucky Oaks points in the bank in her last start and she’ll go for more later this meet in the Grade 3, $400,000 Fantasy at Oaklawn Park. But the first order of business is the third race Sunday.

Queen Bridget is part of a strong field of seven for the optional $80,000 claiming allowance for 3-year-old fillies at a mile and a sixteenth. Kansas Kis enters off a runner-up finish in the Busher Invitational at Aqueduct, Jilted Bride was third to a pair of next-out graded stakes winners in a Feb. 15 allowance at Oaklawn, and Daphne Moon launches her season after running fifth in last year’s Grade 1 Frizette.

Queen Bridge exits a fourth in the Grade 3 Honeybee, a Kentucky Oaks points race March 7 at Oaklawn. She was then tabbed for the Fantasy, which was to be run April 10. However, the race has been rescheduled for May 1 because the Kentucky Oaks has been postponed to September.

“Because the Fantasy moved, this allowance-level race is just another prep,” trainer John Ortiz said. “The timing was perfect between races.”

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Queen Bridget was making her first start at 3 in the 1 1/16-mile Honeybee. She earned a career-high Beyer Speed Figure of 73.

“I usually just let just horses tell me when they’re ready to run,” Ortiz said. “She had a really nice 2-year-old campaign and we gave her a nice, big break. She kept getting better and better in the morning, and we put her in there. We couldn’t be any happier the way she performed that day. Obviously, it was a little tougher first start back.”

The Honeybee was a rare dirt appearance for Queen Bridget, who won her maiden on turf last October at Indiana Grand. She is a daughter of Verrazano and the Thunder Gulch mare Queen Dido. She races for Mary Ann Gould.

“Her family has done very well on both the turf and the dirt,” Ortiz said. “The thinking last year was running on the turf was a little easier on 2-year-olds, being more of a natural footing. For her, I thought we’d give her a chance because her family had done well on the turf.”

Queen Bridget will break from post 2 under Channing Hill.

Later on the card, Hill has the mount on leading contender Manny Wah in the eighth race, an optional $100,000 claiming sprint. Manny Wah in December was third in the Grade 1 Malibu at Santa Anita.

The ninth and final race on the card is a conditioned allowance sprint led by Strike That, a winner of 2 of 3 starts who owns the field’s co-highest last-race Beyer Speed Figure, an 80.