Someday the Eclipse Award for outstanding 3-year-old filly may be won by a filly who runs only on grass. When it does finally happen, the Eclipse winner’s campaign may be similar to the 2024 campaign of She Feels Pretty, who also is a finalist as outstanding turf female.
A pair of decisive Grade 1 wins by She Feels Pretty solidified her reputation as the country’s top 3-year-old turf filly and Eclipse finalist for 3-year-old filly regardless of surface. Thorpedo Anna won six dirt races last year; She Feels Pretty’s all-turf campaign included two dominating Grade 1s late in the season.
Cherie DeVaux trains She Feels Pretty for Roy and Gretchen Jackson’s Lael Stables, which acquired the filly for $240,000 as a yearling at the 2022 Keeneland September sale. The filly, by Karakontie, entered 2024 following a successful 2023, when she won the Grade 1 Natalma at Woodbine and ran third with a wide trip in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf at Santa Anita.
For the filly’s first start at 3, DeVaux and the Jacksons chose the $100,000 Old Hilltop Stakes on May 17 at Pimlico. It was her first start in six months, and DeVaux acknowledged to jockey John Velazquez, “I don’t know if I have her 100 percent.” She did not need to be perfect.
:: Full list of 2024 Eclipse Awards finalists, including profile stories
She Feels Pretty crushed the Old Hilltop by more than five lengths “ridden out.” It was the ideal start to a campaign that would get tougher. She Feels Pretty subsequently raced exclusively in Grade 1 and Grade 2 races. Her next start was July 6 at Aqueduct in the Grade 1 Fasig-Tipton Belmont Oaks Invitational. The 1 3/16-mile race was her first try beyond a mile.
The distance did not get her beat. It was her trip. She Feels Pretty, odds-on, pressed the pace and finished third by three-quarters of a length. Velazquez told NYRA publicity, “I really think she’s better off covered up, but we just didn’t have any cover for her today and then she kind of hung,”
Next was Grade 2 Lake Placid at Saratoga, and another tough beat. She Feels Pretty tends to wait on rivals, and missed by a neck. Three starts into the filly’s campaign, DeVaux was still making adjustments. The trainer told NYRA publicity She Feels Pretty “kind of waits on her company, so we may try to experiment with some blinkers and see if that helps her get out of that habit.”
Adding blinkers for her final two starts of 2024, She Feels Pretty was overpowering. She crushed the Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup at Keeneland, winning by six. The difference? Blinkers and trip. She Feels Pretty was covered early and exploded late. But could she reproduce the effort?
The final Grade 1 turf race of 2024 was the American Oaks, a 1 1/4-mile race Dec. 26 at Santa Anita. She Feels Pretty was odds-on again. Keen early, she settled, then rallied wide and ran away by 2 1/2 lengths to put an exclamation mark on an outstanding season.
She Feels Pretty won three races and $775,938 from five starts in 2024; her career record is five wins from eight starts, with earnings of $1,128,317. Plans call for She Feels Pretty to campaign as a 4-year-old in 2025. Her long-range objective is the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf on Nov. 1 at Del Mar.
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