Shippers may hold advantage in Pocahontas Stakes
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Next spring’s 152nd running of the Kentucky Oaks is expected to bring together the best 3-year-old fillies from around the country. Fillies shipping in might have an edge in the first points race toward the Oaks, the Grade 3, $300,000 Pocahontas Stakes at Churchill Downs on Saturday.
In a field of seven 2-year-old fillies going a one-turn mile, Dazzling Dame is the only prior stakes winner and only one to win at a mile to date. Fellow Mid-Atlantic shipper Embrace the Moment is stretching out and owns the highest Beyer Speed Figure in the field.
The Pocahontas awards its top five finishers points toward the 2026 Oaks on the 10-5-3-2-1 scale. The race also is part of the Breeders’ Cup’s “Dirt Dozen” program, with the top three finishers earning a tiered bonus bankroll that can be used toward pre-entry and entry fees for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies on Oct. 31 at Del Mar. No Pocahontas winner has doubled up in the Juvenile Fillies since champion Epitome won both races in 1987. In a little more than a decade, two recent Pocahontas winners have gone on to take the following year’s Oaks – Untapable (2013) and Serengeti Empress (2018).
Dazzling Dame, a Girvin filly based with Brittany Russell at the Fair Hill Training Center, is taking her first major road trip, but she won her first two starts on different tracks. She won her debut going 5 1/2 furlongs on June 27 at Laurel Park, then stretched out to a mile to win the Sorority Stakes on Aug. 17 at Monmouth Park, earning a Beyer of 64 in both efforts.
Dazzling Dame broke a step slowly in her debut but was away much better in the Sorority and was allowed to dictate a moderate tempo, getting the opening quarter in 24 seconds and the half in 48.64 before drawing clear. Her tractability for Jevian Toledo – who is replaced by Luis Saez as she heads out of town – suggests she is not a need-the-lead type.
Similarly, although Embrace the Moment set sharper fractions of 22.80 and 46.19 en route to clearing late in her six-furlong debut Aug. 28 at Delaware Park, trainer Greg Compton believes the filly, who earned a 69 Beyer, is not speed crazy.
“She did a lot of that on her own,” Compton said. “She was on a long rein the whole time, pretty much.”
Pedigree and demeanor could help Embrace the Moment stretch out. Both her half-siblings, Heavenville and Carbone, won at a mile, with the latter also stakes-placed at the distance. Embrace the Moment is from the first crop of leading freshman sire Yaupon – a Grade 1-winning sprinter by classic sire Uncle Mo.
Trainers of Yaupon’s progeny have extolled their good minds, which Embrace the Moment seems to have inherited, boding well for both her ability to ship and to rate. Compton described the filly as “very sensible,” and pointed to her first experience paddock-schooling before her debut.
“She was just a tick nervous, not terrible, pretty curious,” Compton said. “And when we brought her back [on race day], it was like she had run two or three times already. Just old news to her.”
Embrace the Moment and Jaime Rodriguez, who also was aboard in her debut, have drawn the outside post, just outside Dazzling Dame. They have a long run down the chute and out of the backstretch to get position.
The Kentucky-based fillies are led by a duo for Kenny McPeek, who has won the Pocahontas a record four times – with Dothraki Queen (2015), Daddys Lil Darling (2016), Fun and Feisty (2022), and V V’s Dream (2023). He will saddle Our Two Girls, a maiden special weight winner going six furlongs Aug. 2 at Ellis Park with a 63 Beyer. He also has Taken by the Wind, whose debut win came in a maiden/optional-claiming race at Saratoga going seven furlongs.
The field is completed by three maidens. Miss Complicated was third in her debut at Churchill before she was runner-up to Our Two Girls last out.
Starlit Sky has good seasoning, with three prior outings, including two at a mile on turf. Most recently, she was a game third, beaten a length total, in a maiden at Monmouth after a stretch duel.
Joke Maker, on the board in both her starts, was cross-entered, but scratched out of a maiden special weight on Thursday evening at Churchill in favor of running here.
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