LEXINGTON, Ky. – If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

One year ago, Ce Ce used one-sided victories in the Princess Rooney at Gulfstream Park and the Chillingworth Stakes at Santa Anita as stepping-stones to her 2 1/2-length victory in the 2021 Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint.

Trainer Michael McCarthy saw no reason not to put her on the same schedule in 2022, and Ce Ce looked every bit as good, winning the same two races in equally dominant fashion as a prelude to defending her title Saturday at Keeneland in the $1 million Filly and Mare Sprint.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – It comes down to this: In Europe, Thoroughbreds are turf horses. Racing in America has a heart made of dirt.

Lashkari in 1984 and Pebbles in 1985 won the first and second editions of the Breeders’ Cup Turf. That’s one bookend over time: The other is the nine overseas winners during the last two Breeders’ Cups, five at Del Mar in 2021, four at Keeneland in 2020.

Americans somehow swept the 2-year-old grass races on Breeders’ Cup Friday two years ago, but Europeans came back to win all four Saturday grass contests.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Bill Mott’s back ached Monday morning. Fair enough. Mott, who turns 70 next summer, galloped his own horses until he was in his mid-40s. Nevertheless, Mott picked up a rake to help assistant trainer Neil Poznansky smooth out heaped shaving covering the shed row. It was getting on toward noon. Someone asked Mott what he did for entertainment after work. “This,” he said.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – It was the worst of times, it was the best of times. No, not the French Revolution – the 2021 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf.

Charlie Appleby looked on as Albahr, a colt he trained, flipped in the gate at Del Mar and was scratched. So, too, was Appleby’s main chance, Modern Games. Whoops. A scratch mistakenly called into stewards, an epic fail, soon was righted – sort of. Modern Games raced for purse money only. Bettors who liked him watched, aghast, as he won easily.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Chad Brown set records by winning 4 of 7 runnings of the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf from 2012-18, but it has now been four years since Sistercharlie became the most recent horse to win it for the champion trainer.

LEXINGTON, Ky. -- The two-day Breeders’ Cup event scheduled for Friday and Saturday at Keeneland Racecourse in Lexington, Ky., will be the first to be run under the limited jurisdiction of the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority, with the most notable impact being on the number of times a rider can use a whip in the race.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Bob Baffert enjoyed great success at the two runnings of the Breeders’ Cup held at Keeneland. It looks he could be ready for more when the 39th Breeders’ Cup returns to Keeneland on Friday and Saturday.

In 2015, Baffert brought only one starter, but that was American Pharoah, the Triple Crown winner who romped in the $6 million Breeders’ Cup Classic, capping off what was billed as a “Grand Slam” and Horse of the Year campaign.

KEENELAND
Weather: Cloudy
Temperature: 49
Track: Fast
Turf: Good

LEXINGTON, KY – With every Breeders’ Cup starter required to be on the grounds by 11 a.m. Tuesday, Keeneland was a beehive of activity throughout training hours Wednesday. One of the most popular spots was the starting gate, which hosted dozens of schoolers throughout the course of the morning, including the entire contingent from the barn of trainer Aidan O’Brien.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Susan Moulton will have runners both days of the Breeders’ Cup in Manny Wah and homebred Andthewinneris, both graded stakes winners at Keeneland, and both carrying the sentimental silks of her late father, Naylor Morton.

“It’s been amazing – the silks I use are my father’s,” she explained. “I had some silks in the past, but when my father passed, I started using his.”

LEXINGTON, Ky. – American Apple used a well-timed late run to score a $97 upset in the Grade 3 Matron Stakes on Oct. 8 at Aqueduct. She and 28-year-old trainer Daniel Leitch are again considered longshots in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint on Friday at Keeneland.

California-born Leitch moved to Kentucky as a child with his mother, who worked as an exercise rider for, among others, trainer John Ward.

“I grew up on the track,” he said. “Any time I had off school, I’d go to the track and help her out.”