Bob Baffert's talented Midnight Memories, a winner of three out of her four starts, heads Sunday's Grade 2, $200,000 Zenyatta Stakes at Santa Anita, an important prep to the Grade 1, $2 million Breeders' Cup Distaff at Keeneland Nov. 5.
Named for one of racing all-time greats who defeated males here in the 2009 Breeders' Cup Classic, was named 2010 Horse of the Year and garnered a total of four Eclipse Awards in winning 19 out of her 20 lifetime races, the Zenyatta is for fillies and mares three and up at a mile and one sixteenth.
Unraced at two, Midnight Memories was a first-out maiden winner going 6 ½ furlongs here on April 30 and she overcame a troubled start to take a first condition allowance by a neck on June 5. A well beaten third as the 8-5 favorite in a six furlong allowance July 28, she came back in her first try around two turns to post an upset three quarter length win going one mile versus sophomore fillies in the G3 Torrey Pines Stakes at Del Mar Sept. 4.
Owned and bred in Kentucky by Mike Pegram, Karl Watson and Paul Weitman, Midnight Memories, who is by Mastery and is out of the Midnight Lute mare Tiz Midnight, has faced older fillies and mares in three out of her four starts.
A 4-year-old filly by Distorted Humor, the Richard Mandella-trained Soothsay was likely in need of her most recent start, a fourth-place finish in the G1 Clement L. Hirsch Stakes going 1 1/16 miles on Aug. 6—her first start in 13 months.
A winner of the G2 Santa Anita Oaks and G3 Indiana Oaks at age three, Soothsay, who is out of the Bernardini mare Spellbound, is owned by Perry Bass II, Ramona Bass, Adele Dilschneider and Waddell Hancock II. With three wins and a second, she'll be ridden back by Mike Smith.
THE GRADE II ZENYATTA WITH JOCKEYS & WEIGHTS IN POST POSITION ORDER
Race 4 of 10 – Approximate post time 2:30 p.m. PT
- Empire House—Drayden Van Dyke–122
- Midnight Memories—Ramon Vazquez—12
- Soothsay—Mike Smith—122
- Awake At Midnyte—Mario Gutierrez—118
- Samurai Charm—Juan Hernandez—122
First post time for a 10-race card that will include three other stakes, is at 1 p.m.
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