Alabama Stakes

Blind Luck (Pollard's Vision--Lucky One, by Best of Luck), champion 3-year-old filly of 2010 and a finalist for the Eclipse Award during her freshman campaign, passed away in April in Japan two days after foaling a colt by Kitasan Black (Jpn), according to Japanese studbook records. Bred in Kentucky by Bill and Terry Baker's Fairlawn Farm, the chestnut filly with a white blaze was consigned by that operation to the 2008 Fasig-Tipton July Sale, where she was hammered down to Juvenal Diaz's Omega Farm for $11,000 and was bought back...

Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna) deserves all the credit in world for her game performance in the GI DraftKings Travers Stakes. Facing off against one of the toughest Travers fields in memory, she beat everyone but Eclipse Award winner Fierceness (City of Light), losing by a diminishing head. She finished ahead of the GI Toyota Blue Grass winner and GI Kentucky Derby runner-up Sierra Leone (Gun Runner) and GI Belmont S. and GI Haskell S. winner Dornoch (Good Magic) and four other males. It was a special effort by a special...

There were two Grade I races last weekend in North America, one at Saratoga and one at Del Mar. One was on the dirt and one was on the turf, one at 10 furlongs and the other at nine furlongs. Other than both being carded for 3-year-old fillies, what did they have in common? Each was won by a daughter of a Lane's End sire. Union Rags captured the GI Alabama Stakes with Power Squeeze, while Twirling Candy took the GI Del Mar Oaks with Iscreamuscream. To add to the...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY -- Once the $1.25-million GI Travers Stakes is history, 'TDN Rising Star' Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna) will head back to running against fillies. Trainer Kenny McPeek said he has no plans on running his talented miss against the colts after the centerpiece of the summer meeting at the Spa. "No, no, no," McPeek said outside of his barn at annex off the Oklahoma Training Track Thursday morning. "A 3-year-old filly against the colts in the Breeders' Cup Classic? Unless it fell apart." The plan moving forward for...

It took trainer Phil Bauer and his owner Richard Rigney a little while to figure the racing game out. From the time Bauer went to work for Rigney in 2013 through 2021, the stable had never had more than 17 wins in a year or earnings in excess of $1,724,016. But the last three years have seen the stable flourish into a win machine and one that can compete at the highest levels of the sport. From 2022 to present, Bauer has had 70 winners from 316 starters for a...

Kenny McPeek announced Saturday that his superstar 3-year-old filly Thorpedo Anna (Fast Anna) will make her next start in the Aug. 24 GI DraftKings Travers S. McPeek had kept the decision to himself for a few days, but no one should have been surprised when he picked the Travers. That's McPeek's style, to be bold, to embrace a challenge to think outside of the box. There's no trainer like him. He has pulled this trick off before, winning 2020 GI Preakness S. with the filly Swiss Skydiver (Daredevil). "I just...

Keeneland Sales, which will continue to be presenting sponsor of the GI Alabama Stakes at Saratoga Race Course this summer, will also be the presenting sponsor of this year's GI Del Mar Oaks. Both races for 3-year-old fillies will be held Aug. 17. "Keeneland is thrilled to once again collaborate with the New York Racing Association and the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club in sponsoring prestigious summer stakes," Keeneland Vice President of Sales Tony Lacy said. "Endorsements such as these allow us to celebrate Keeneland sales graduates from coast to coast...

Miss Justify (Justify) rallied smartly along the fence in the stretch to capture Friday's $135,000 Wilton Stakes at Saratoga. Third in the Smart Halo Stakes while making her final start for trainer Susan Cooney at Laurel last November, the bay made two previous attempts for Todd Pletcher this term, including a front-running, last-out win going a one-turn mile in an optional claimer at Churchill Downs June 1. Backed at odds of 5-2 here, the rail-drawn Miss Justify chased from fourth through an opening quarter in :23.71. She crept up closer...

SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY -- It's a tossup as to what is the biggest sporting event this weekend for trainer Jeremiah Englehart. The choices are these: the $175,000 GIII Sanford Stakes at Saratoga Race Course on Saturday or the Vermont Lacrosse Classic two and a half hours away in the town of Essex. Come again? Englehart will do double duty because three of his five kids are in the lacrosse travel tournament. He wont miss that. And he can't be absent from the Spa because he has to to saddle Mo...

Richard and Connie Snyder moved their commercial breeding operation from New Mexico to Kentucky nine years ago with the aim of competing at the highest levels of the game. The Snyders' Cove Springs Farm seems to have that goal well in its grasp after a memorable August which saw the operation represented by its first Grade I winner when Randomized (Nyquist) captured the GI Alabama S. and by a high-water mark in the sales ring when a colt by Not This Time brought $725,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Saratoga sale. Cove...

When Joel Rosario won his first GI Alabama S. back in 2010, he had to come from the tail of the field on Blind Luck (Pollard's Vision) in a race run at a crawl and culminating in a pulsating, driving finish with an upstart filly named Havre de Grace (Saint Liam). Leaving little to chance in pursuit of a second victory in the meet's premier race for the sophomore filly set, the Dominican native kicked Klaravich Stables' Randomized (Nyquist) straight into the lead from a wide alley Saturday afternoon and...

Repole Stable, Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners and Michael House's Nest (Curlin) left little doubt who the best 3-year-old filly in the country is with a second straight tour-de-force victory over GI Kentucky Oaks heroine Secret Oath (Arrogate) in Saturday's GI Alabama S. at Saratoga. The overwhelming 1-5 favorite wasn't off to the smoothest of beginnings, bobbling slightly and bumping with longshot Nostalgic (Medaglia d'Oro) at the start. It didn't seem to matter one bit once the 1 1/4-mile journey was officially underway with Nest finding a perfect spot in a stalking...