An exceptional 2024 campaign makes Thorpedo Anna favored to earn an Eclipse Award as outstanding 3-year-old filly, and a candidate for Horse of the Year.
She fits both categories. Thorpedo Anna won five Grade 1s and six graded stakes overall in 2024, more than any horse in North America. Thorpedo Anna was almost unbeatable for trainer Kenny McPeek and jockey Brian Hernandez Jr.
Owned by Brookdale Racing, Mark Edwards, breeder Judy Hicks, and the Magdalena Racing syndicate of McPeek and his wife, Sherri, Thorpedo Anna was the country’s most accomplished stakes winner.
She won two of the most prestigious races for fillies and mares, the Longines Kentucky Oaks and Longines Breeders’ Cup Distaff, and earned the highest figure of her career – a 111 Beyer Speed Figure – finishing second against males in the Grade 1 Travers.
Yet the season was not without drama for Thorpedo Anna, sired by the late Fast Anna. Following a juvenile campaign in which Thorpedo Anna won 2 of 3 and placed in a Grade 2, McPeek began preparations for her 3-year-old campaign. A setback postponed her return.
“We came in one morning, and she hit her hip on something and had this huge bruise on her hip,” McPeek said. Veterinarians recommended 30 days off. “I think that 30 days she missed actually helped her fill out a little more.”
:: Full list of 2024 Eclipse Awards finalists, including profile stories
Thorpedo Anna finally made her first start of 2024 in late March at Oaklawn Park. Despite a four-month layoff, she won the Grade 2 Fantasy Stakes by four lengths.
“That Fantasy was like, oh wow! We’ve got a really good one on our hands,” McPeek said. He had not seen anything yet.
Next out in the Kentucky Oaks, McPeek advised Hernandez to be bold. “Get her out there and let her roll,” McPeek said. Hernandez put Thorpedo Anna on the lead, and the filly did the rest. She won by 4 1/2 lengths.
Thorpedo Anna dominated both starts against fillies in Grade 1s at Saratoga – the DK Horse Acorn and Coaching Club American Oaks. McPeek ambitiously entered her next in the DraftKings Travers, against colts. Thorpedo Anna missed by a head to subsequent Breeders’ Cup Classic runner-up Fierceness, while finishing in front of subsequent Breeders’ Cup Classic winner Sierra Leone.
The Grade 1 Cotillion in September at Parx Racing was next, and on paper Thorpedo Anna looked like a cinch. But her trip was less than ideal. Boxed inside and trapped, she was fully extended to win by a neck.
Thorpedo Anna’s final start of the year was at Del Mar in the Breeders’ Cup Distaff, a race from which main rivals Idiomatic, Adare Manor, and Awesome Result either scratched or retired. However, Thorpedo Anna faced a last-minute hiccup.
In transit from New York to California, the filly scraped her hip and stifle. She skipped her first scheduled day of training at Del Mar, merely jogged the following day, and then was right back into the swing of it. The brief scare turned out to be a non-factor.
Thorpedo Anna wired the Breeders’ Cup Distaff by 2 1/2 lengths, putting an exclamation mark on an Eclipse-worthy campaign. Thorpedo Anna won six races and $3,653,050 from seven starts in 2024. Overall, she has eight wins and two seconds from 10 starts, with career earnings of $3,843,663.
Plans call for Thorpedo Anna to campaign in 2025 at age 4.
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