Graded stakes four-peats are a rare thing. A high-level equine performer almost always is retired to life at the farm before such an opportunity arises, and considering that most stakes for 2- and 3-year-olds are age-restricted and can’t be won twice a string of graded stakes wins likely begins at 4. That means the chance at four in a row comes as a 7-year-old. How many of those are up to the task? War Like Goddess, for one. Winner of the Bewitch Stakes during the 2021 spring meeting at Keeneland, War Like Goddess won the 2022 Bewitch in the first start of her 5-year-old campaign, did the same thing at age 6, and in her 7-year-old debut Friday at Keeneland, War Like Goddess is reasonably priced at 3-5 on the morning line of the Grade 3, $300,000 Bewitch. Six-year-old War Like Goddess appeared the equal of her 4- and 5-year-old self. She won the Bewitch with a robust 101 Beyer Speed Figure before an impossible trip too far behind a crawling pace got her beat at odds-on in the Grade 1 New York Stakes. War Like Goddess is no angel, and her rank racing behavior in the Glens Falls last August led to a second surprising defeat, but the mare ran back to her best beating males for the second straight year in the Grade 1 Joe Hirsch Turf Classic. War Like Goddess capped 2023 with a seventh-place finish in the Breeders’ Cup Turf, and even that showing was strong. Drawn widest in an 11-horse field, War Like Goddess raced from last and came into the short Santa Anita homestretch with plenty of run but blocked by a wall of horses. Jockey Junior Alvarado took a hard right with his mount, but even then, War Like Goddess lost her spot to onrushing Onesto. Finally clear in the last furlong, she finished with energy as good or better than any of the six in front of her and galloped out ahead of everyone. :: Get the Inside Track with the FREE DRF Morning Line Email Newsletter. Subscribe now.  Most mares of this accomplishment would have run themselves straight to the breeding shed. Owner George Krikorian wanted another year – at least – with this fabulous racehorse. “Mr. Krikorian thought if she was able to race, that’s what we’d do with her. He’s got plenty of broodmares, and just because a mare is a good race mare doesn’t make them a good broodmare. I guess he just likes the action,” trainer Bill Mott said. Mott foresees no diminishment in performance. “You never know until you run them, but she acts very good, she’s been sharp and aggressive, and her works have been good,” Mott said. “Her training has been very similar, but I probably haven’t gotten as much into her as last year.” War Like Goddess likes no course more than Keeneland, her lone defeat in four starts a fine third in the 2022 Breeders’ Cup Turf. As often happens, War Like Goddess lands in a 1 1/2-mile grass contest lacking pace, but in each of the last two Bewitches, she sat close to slow fractions and overwhelmed the opposition with a superior finishing burst. A similar outcome is likely on closing day of Keeneland’s spring season. Whoever seizes control of the pace ought to have a tactical advantage. Vergara, who returns from a winter break, often leads or presses but hardly is a horse with real speed, and her two wins the last two calendar years came at Kentucky Downs. Atomic Blonde has the strongest general form outside War Like Goddess but ran poorly in the E.P. Taylor and was eased after suffering exercise-induced pulmonary hemorrhaging in the Long Island Stakes. That’s unlikely to be an issue again, but Atomic Blonde has even less early foot than War Like Goddess. :: Bet with the Best! Get FREE All-Access PPs and Weekly Cashback when you wager on DRF Bets. Chop Chop has gone 2-0-1 in her limited three-start grass career and never has raced beyond 1 1/16 miles, but she can dictate the Bewitch pace from her rail draw and might be the right kind of horse to stay this extended trip. War Like Goddess is the kind of horse, rarely found, who can win the same graded stakes race four years in a row. :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.