There has been no need for a photo finish camera when Fun to Dream races. When she wins, she wins big and she'll try for another laugher in Sunday's $100,000 Betty Grable Stakes at Del Mar. It's the last of the opening weekend's stakes races and features a compact field of five California-bred fillies and mares going seven furlongs.
Bob Baffert's Fun to Dream has won three of her four starts and has been the favorite in all of them. The Arrogate filly comes into the race off a victory in an entry level allowance/claimer at Santa Anita last month. She went off at 2-5 that day and didn't disappoint, winning by four lengths in the end.
“She's doing really well,” Baffert says. “She's been a lot of fun. She's by one of my all-time favorite horses, Arrogate.”
Baffert is also co-owner and breeder of the filly. Fun to Dream has won her three races by a combined 20 ¾ lengths, breaking her maiden by 6 ¼ lengths and winning the Fleet Treat at Del Mar this past summer by 9 ¾ lengths. She's cutting back in distance from a mile and a sixteenth in her last.
“She ran one bad race where she came out (and was disqualified),” Baffert said. “I took the blinkers off her for her last race and stretched her out. I think she's better going two turns. We're limited on races, on where to run her. She's a Cal-bred and we thought we'd take advantage of our Cal-bred status. After this it's all open company from here on out.”
Baffert trained Arrogate, the 2016 champion 3-year-old male who died in 2020 during his third season at stud at Juddmonte Farms in Kentucky. The son of Unbridled's Song won seven of 11 career starts as a 3- and 4-year old, including four consecutive Grade 1 races: the 2016 Travers and Breeders' Cup Classic, followed by the 2017 Pegasus World Cup Invitational Stakes and Dubai World Cup.
Fun to Dream will likely be tested by Big Novel from the John Sadler barn. The 3-year old daughter of Mr. Big has finished in the money in all eight of her career starts, winning twice. She's run in Cal-bred stakes five times with three runner-up finishes but hasn't raced since April.
“She's a hard knocking filly,” Sadler says. “We gave her a little bit of a vacation after her last start. She was second down there (at Del Mar) last fall behind my other one, Big Switch, so we think she fits the conditions of the race and look forward to getting her started back.”
The Betty Grable goes off as the eighth of nine races Sunday. It's named after the late film star who was a box office sensation in the 1940's and a Del Mar regular in the '40's and '50's.
Here's the field from the rail with the jockeys and morning line odds: Roman Empress (Drayden Van Dyke, 30-1); All Dialed In (Tyler Baze, 6-1); Fun to Dream (Juan Hernandez, 3-5); Big Novel (Flavien Prat, 8-5) and Taming the Tigress (Ramon Vasquez, 10-1).
The post ‘She’s By One Of My All-Time Favorite Horses’: Baffert Filly Fun To Dream Seeks Second Stakes Win In Betty Grable For Cal-Breds appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.
