HOT SPRINGS, Ark. – Ensorcell had every reason to throw in the towel in her most recent start, but she persevered despite a difficult trip and returns to face winners for the first time in Sunday’s eighth race at Oaklawn Park.
The entry-level allowance is for 3-year-old fillies at 1 1/16 miles. It drew a field of nine and is led by the stakes-placed runners California Sunset, Enchanting, Legal Empress, and Spankerboom.
Ensorcell won a maiden special weight for 3-year-olds and up by a neck in her last start Feb. 17. A rival carried her out wider and wider with each passing stride during the stretch run of the 1 1/16-mile race. But a determined Ensorcell kept on to secure her first career win after a pair of troubled starts at the meet.
“She ran really well,” said trainer Ron Moquett. “She’s a tough, tough filly.”
Ensorcell is a daughter of Not This Time and the mare On Fire Baby, a past winner of the Grade 1 Apple Blossom at Oaklawn who overall earned more than $1 million. Ensorcell is one of two offspring of On Fire Baby racing Sunday at Oaklawn. The other is Stoke the Fire, who will start as a top contender in the second race, a maiden route.
Anita Ebert bred and owns both horses, and also bred and raced On Fire Baby.
“She does well and she raises them well,” Moquett said. “And when she wins a race, all the retired Thoroughbreds ought to be thankful.”
Ebert has been a champion of the Ring the Bell program at Oaklawn that supports the Arkansas Thoroughbred Retirement and Rehabilitation Foundation. The owner also has had homebred success this meet with In Just My Heels, a two-time winner at the current stand who is out of the Ebert-bred and -raced Grade 2 winner High Heels.
Ensorcell has natural speed and could be somewhat prominent Sunday when she starts from post 2 under Rafael Bejarano.
California Sunset will start from post 4 and looks like a chief player after running second by a head in a first-level allowance at this distance last out at Fair Grounds. Earlier in the New Orleans meet she was third in the Untapable Stakes. Ramon Vazquez has the mount for trainer Brad Cox.
Enchanting enters off a runner-up finish in the Sunland Park Oaks. Legal Empress ran third in the Martha Washington in January at Oaklawn. Spankerboom was third in the Prairie Gold Lassie last year at Prairie Meadows.
The card Sunday also includes an appearance by Just Steel, the runner-up in last year’s Grade 1 Arkansas Derby. He goes in the seventh race, a second-level allowance for 4-year-olds and up at one mile. Just Steel will be stretching back out to two turns after contesting the pace and finishing a close fifth in a quick February allowance sprint that marked his first out since the Preakness. Nik Juarez has the mount from the rail for trainer D. Wayne Lukas. Just Steel races for BC Stables and Henry Schmueckle.
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