ARCADIA, Calif. – Opinions differ regarding the Grade 2 Oak Leaf Stakes for 2-year-old fillies Saturday at Santa Anita.
One popular notion is that odds-on program favorite Explora is a slam dunk in the 1 1/16-mile route, based on her highly rated debut victory and fast-paced runner-up finish in the Grade 1 Del Mar Debutante at seven furlongs.
ARCADIA, Calif. – Elite 2-year-olds trained by Bob Baffert come in waves, and the next set arrives Saturday in the Grade 1 American Pharoah Stakes at Santa Anita.
Baffert trains four of the six who are entered in the American Pharoah, a 1 1/16-mile race he has won a record 13 times, including the last four.
While the Coolmore Turf Mile, a Grade 1 with a $1.25 million purse, carries heft in its own right, it also serves as a stepping-stone to the Breeders’ Cup Mile. And this year’s renewal, featured race Saturday on a blockbuster Keeneland card, came up Breeders’ Cup-tough.
The dozen entrants include a trio of Europeans, an unusually strong overseas presence in this race. Connections of all three have legitimate Breeders’ Cup hopes. Diego Velazquez won a Group 1 in his last start; Woodshauna won a Group 1 over the summer; and Jonquil missed by a head in a Group 1 in May.
If you liked last year’s Breeders’ Cup, chances are you’re going to like this year’s as well.
Not only is the 42nd Breeders’ Cup being held for the second straight year at Del Mar, just outside San Diego, Calif., but five horses who won Breeders’ Cup races in 2024 are expected back to try and repeat in their respective divisions. That quintet includes Classic winner Sierra Leone, Turf winner Rebel’s Romance, Distaff winner Thorpedo Anna, Sprint winner Straight No Chaser, and Dirt Mile winner Full Serrano.
The morning-line favorite, World Record, never has won a stakes race against older rivals. Second-choice Nakatomi hasn’t won a race of any kind in 15 months. The field’s only graded stakes winners this year, Durante and Watchatalkinabout, sit, respectively, at 15-1 and 6-1 on the line. A grand total of just six were entered, and you’d say Friday’s Grade 2, $400,000 Phoenix Stakes at Keeneland came up soft – but for the fact the entire North American dirt-sprint division, this year and last, came up soft.
HALLANDALE BEACH, Fla. – Choose Joy, the onetime undisputed leader of the local filly and mare turf sprint division, will try to work her way back to the top again Friday at Gulfstream Park in the featured $58,000 allowance. Carded at five furlongs on the grass, race 9 has lured a field of eight that includes stakes-tested stablemates Beauty of the Sea and Etrurian from the barn of trainer Joe Orseno.
LEXINGTON, Ky. – The Grade 2, $400,000 Jessamine Stakes on opening day at Keeneland offers an automatic berth into the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf on Oct. 31 at Del Mar. The race is not only a chance for 2-year-old fillies to step up on the turf – the majority entered do not yet have stakes experience – but for some trainers to continue pursuing career milestones, as well.
One cost $140,000 as a yearling at Keeneland in 2022, the other $75,000 at the same auction a year later.
With those bargain buys, cousins George Messina and Mike Lee had acquired two fillies in Stellify and Fionn who this fall rate among the best American chances for the $2 million Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf on Nov. 1 at Del Mar.
The fillies, trained by Brad Cox, have both earned more than $1.4 million this year.
She races with her head turned slightly to the right, but two races into her career, all the 2-year-old filly Tommy Jo has done is turn heads. And if, as her trainer strongly believes will be the case, Tommy Jo transfers her one-turn form around two turns, she will allow you to turn $2 into about $2.40 in the Alcibiades Stakes on Friday, opening day at Keeneland.
Since its addition to the Breeders’ Cup program in 2008, the Turf Sprint has been a race where fillies and mares regularly take on males, with good results.
Mizdirection (2012, 2013), Belvoir Bay (2019), Glass Slippers (2020), and Caravel (2022) are all females who have landed in the winner’s circle. Additionally, Gotta Have Her (second in 2009), Unzip Me (third in 2010), Reneesgotzip (third in 2012, second in 2013), Lady Shipman (third in 2015), Charmaine’s Mia (third in 2021), and Ag Bullet (third in 2024) have finished on the board.
