LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The 152nd edition of the Grade 1, $1.5 million Kentucky Oaks will take less than two minutes to run beneath the lights Friday night at Churchill Downs. But it takes more than those two minutes to win the 1 1/8-mile Oaks.
Success on the big stage is the result of gaining experience in the trenches in carefully planned campaigns, as well as months of behind-the-scenes work by trainers and their staff to have each filly both physically and mentally ready for the challenge.
“Every horse is different, so we do do different things,” said Mark Casse, who saddles Counting Stars and Search Party, the one-two finishers in Grade 2 Fantasy Stakes, for the Oaks. “The basis is probably there, but you will tweak it just a little. . . . We kind of do everything similar, we just tweak it a little depending on their physique and how they handle. Some, if you don’t train them hard enough, are jumping out of their skin. Every horse is a little different.”
Details will matter in an extraordinarily well-matched Oaks field. Eight of the 13 expected starters, following some scratches that emptied the also-eligible list, have career-best Beyer Speed Figures in the same five-point range, from 87 to 92. Six fillies were made between 4-1 and 8-1 on the morning line.
“I see six or seven horses that could be right there on the wire,” said Michael McCarthy, who sends out Meaning and Brooklyn Blonde, one-two in the Grade 2 Santa Anita Oaks.
Counting Stars and Meaning were among the final major prep winners and are joined in the gate by Grade 1 Ashland Stakes winner Percy’s Bar, Grade 3 Gazelle Stakes winner Always a Runner, and Grade 2 Gulfstream Park Oaks winner Prom Queen.
Such is the depth of the field that the morning-line favorite is a filly who didn’t win one of those races, Zany, who was second in the Ashland. She was unbeaten in her first three starts but did show greenness, looking around at times. Zany had an educational trip in the Ashland, racing between horses and getting kickback.
That experience could help in the biggest field Zany has faced, particularly since she has drawn post 2 and will almost certainly be behind horses. The long-striding filly also is back to 1 1/8 miles. She is one of just two in this field to previously win at the distance, although pre-Oaks opportunities to do so are limited – and will have a longer stretch to work with. The Ashland finishes at the first wire at Keeneland, and Percy’s Bar cut the corner to get the jump into the stretch while Zany came wide.
“I think it was a good experience for her,” trainer Todd Pletcher said. “I don’t think she necessarily loved the Keeneland track, and with the short run to the sixteenth pole, the first finish line, she was just kind of getting untracked at that point. . . . I think it was a good experience for her and sets her up well.”
Take nothing away from Percy’s Bar, who, along with Bella Ballerina and Counting Stars, won at Churchill Downs last year. Percy’s Bar turned in two good Grade 1 efforts as a 2-year-old. Her trip in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies turned adventurous when, while attempting to advance inside, she was pinballed off the rail near the three-sixteenths pole and recovered to run on for third. She showed no mental effects from that in the Ashland, making an adroit and bold rail move before kicking clear.
Percy’s Bar will make her second start off a layoff in the Oaks. With a harsh winter in Kentucky impacting training, Ben Colebrook decided not to push her for a prep out of town. She certainly does not train like a horse that will bounce.
Always a good work horse, Percy’s Bar returned to the tab after the Ashland with a bullet work in which she was moving easily and never asked. She turned in a more moderate half-mile last week, strategically starting about five lengths behind a stablemate before finishing on near-even terms.
“When she gets behind a horse she relaxes,” Colebrook said.
Percy’s Bar drew post 9, and being drawn in the outside half of the gate should give her the opportunity to drop in, get cover, and relax behind horses. Dazzling Dame, from post 6, is the most likely pacesetter, with Explora also likely to be a factor after drawing the rail. This week’s scratch of My Miss Mo figures to help those two by removing another pace threat.
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The draw is a detail trainers have no control over, and while it worked out well for some key contenders, Bob Baffert said he was “not thrilled” about landing the inside with Explora. Casse also may have preferred to be farther outside than post 4 with Counting Stars – although drawing next door in post 3 doesn’t matter as much for her late-running stablemate Search Party, who could benefit from a hot pace.
Explora spiked a fever after shipping to Oaklawn for the Fantasy and comes into the Oaks having last raced winning the Grade 3 Honeybee Stakes on March 1. Baffert has since managed her training schedule in an attempt to build her foundation. The filly breezed four times in April, including a six-furlong work from the gate and a testing seven-furlong work at Santa Anita. She turned in a sharp five-furlong work over a fast-playing track Sunday at Churchill.
“We gave her a couple of stiff works, made up for it,” Baffert said. “She didn’t get too sick. It was just something we had to deal with.”
Meaning, also troubled in the stretch of the BC Juvenile Fillies in her only loss, is the only filly to defeat Explora this year. Meaning, who is “everything you’d want in a racehorse,” McCarthy says, won the Las Virgenes Stakes in February before returning to win the Santa Anita Oaks.
“We’ll bounce out of there on Friday night and try to find ourselves in a great stalking spot,” McCarthy said. “That’s one less thing to worry about, being drawn in post position 5. You’re close enough to the inside fence, and she’s tactical enough to go ahead and jump away from there and find herself in a good spot. She’ll kind of make her own trip.”
Always a Runner joins Zany as the only entrants to win at 1 1/8 miles, doing so when winning the Gazelle in just her second career start. Prom Queen, who also looks like she will relish added ground, won the Gulfstream Oaks in just her third start.
“Two back, when she broke her maiden, it was a small field, but Javier [Castellano] did a good job of putting her in some tight spots and educating her,” Brad Cox noted of his lightly raced filly. “I think she got a lot out of that race.”
Gazelle runner-up Pashmina, Bourbonette Oaks runner-up Lovely Grey, and Bourbonette third-place finisher Resist complete the field, which morphed considerably with scratches through the week.
Lovely Grey, the first also-eligible when an overflow cast of 17 was dropped into the entry box, drew into the field with the withdrawal of Bottle of Rouge, who was coughing after her final work on Sunday. My Miss Mo was scratched on Wednesday, with trainer Saffie Joseph Jr. saying the filly was "not at the level she needs to be," which allowed Nycon to draw in. On Thursday morning, Bella Ballerina was declared out with a minor injury that trainer Brendan Walsh described as “a ding,” which moved Resist, the last also-eligible, into the outside spot in the starting gate. On Friday morning, Nycon was back out, with trainer Whit Beckman saying there were some "inconsistencies" in her movement.
The trainers who drew in to the field had been in the position this week of attending to the details as if their fillies would run, while not knowing for several days if that would be the case – and knowing that their fortune means misfortune for their peers who have worked just as hard.
"You certainly don't wish anything bad on anybody else, but we kind of treated her all week as if she was running, and figured we'd play the waiting game, and it worked out for us," Tommy Drury, who trains Resist, said. "Obviously, sorry for the ones that it didn't work out for, because I've certainly felt that as well."
The Oaks has a post time of 8:40 p.m. during a prime-time national broadcast on NBC. The Oaks, preceded by six other graded stakes, will be the last of 13 races on the card, which has a first post of 12:30 p.m.
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