The 2013 Breeders’ Cup World Championships are all set to go this weekend, with five races to be run on Friday, and nine more on the card for Saturday at Santa Anita Racetrack. The second Breeders’ Cup race on day two of the event is the $2,000,000 Filly and Mare Turf, for three-year-olds and upwards going 1 1/4 miles. As always with the turf races, the Filly and Mare has drawn a handful of European-breds shipping in, with five expected to making the trip to complete the 10-horse field.
Dank is ready to face her North American rivals
Among those is Dank, who will be making her second start on US soil, and earns the morning line favorite status at 5-2 based on her 4 1/4 length win in the Grade I Beverly D. Stakes at Arlington Park, where she stopped the timer less than two-tenths of a second off the track record for 1 1/16 miles. Prior to that she had won a pair of minor stakes in Ireland and the UK this past summer. Co-second choices at 7-2 are Tiz Flirtatious and Marketing Mix, who battled to a finish in that order in Grade I Rodeo Drive Stakes at Santa Anita last month.
Laughing has yet to lose a race this year
Also in the field is the Irish-bred Laughing (8-1), who has spent the past two seasons racing in North America, and who seems to be running her best as a five-year-old. For 2013 she has won all four of the races she’s entered, and all four have been graded-stakes events, including two grade ones. Four weeks ago she defeated stablemate Tannery in the Grade I Flower Bowl Invitational at 1 1/4 miles on a fast track at Belmont, and last week Tannery came back to win the Grade I EP Taylor Stakes at Woodbine.
Post time for the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf is 12:43 PM PDT
The Grade 2 $1.25 million Pennsylvania Derby features the two biggest names from the Triple Crown trail September 24 at Parx as a field of 12 gathers in one of the most intriguing betting races of the year.
The $1 million Cotillion Stakes September 24 at Parx features a true clash of the titans as the six-horse field is headlined by the undefeated, five-time grade 1 winner Songbird who figures to face the most stern challenge of her career.
In a completely wide open renewal of the Presque Isle Mile September 18 at Presque Isle Downs, 13 runners including the also-eligible will contest the eight furlong trip over synthetic footing.
Champion Songbird is set to make her much-anticipated return to the races in the $200,000 Summertime Oaks at Santa Anita on Saturday. The Grade 2 event will be run at a mile and a sixteenth and has attracted a field of seven.
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