Stardom Bound Makes 2009 Debut in Las Virgenes Stakes

by Patricia Woo | Feb 2 2009

Champion 2-year-old filly Stardom Bound will return to the site of her 2008 Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies win in her much-anticipated 2009 debut on Feb. 7 in the $300,000 Las Virgenes Stakes. This 1-mile test for 3-year-old fillies will be run over the Pro-Ride surface of Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, Calif., and is also scheduled to include recent stakes winner Saucey Evening and Santa Ysabel Stakes champion Century Park.

Before garnering a whopping $5.7M at the Fasig-Tipton Kentucky fall sale in November 2008 and joining the barn of IEAH Stables, Stardom Bound was lighting up racetracks as a 2-year-old. In her first try against Grade 1 company in the $250,000 Del Mar Debutante stakes in September, Stardom Bound utilized her powerful finishing kick in a last-to-first surge to victory. Near the back of the pack once again in her next race – the $250,000 Gr. 1 Oak Leaf Stakes – she found a clear path eight-wide at the top of the lane and easily dispensed with all her rivals. And she won her last race of 2008, the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies, in similarly impressive fashion. Regular jockey Mike Smith will get the mount. Expectations are high for this Bobby Frankel-trained filly, but with regular rider Mike Smith aboard, as well as her style and past performances, all signs indicate she will be more than up for the challenge.

Getting another shot at Stardom Bound in the Las Virgenes is Saucey Evening, a Graham Motion trainee who is coming off a win in the $125,000 Califormia Breeders' Champion Stakes. It marked her second stakes win and showed that she too is capable of coming from behind to win. After finishing behind Stardom Bound twice in 2008 - in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies and the Debutante Stakes - Saucey Evening will need a huge performance to steal the win from the Eclipse-winning champion.

With her longshot win in the $100,000 Santa Ysabel Stakes against another Las Virgenes nominee, Haka, Century Park increased her career earnings to $109,360 and her career victories to two. However, slow fractions in the Santa Ysabel Stakes and a Beyer Speed Figure of only 79 may indicate an inability to stay with the front runners. She is trained by Bob Baffert and will be ridden by Tyler Baze.

Alpha Kitten, who would have posed the greatest threat to Stardom Bound - is out with a broken leg suffered during a workout at Santa Anita Park on Jan. 29. The injury is expected to keep the Santa Ynez Stakes champion out for five or six months, according to trainer John Sadler; she will likely return to training later this year.

The Las Virgenes Stakes' most notable champion is Rags to Riches, who won the race in 2007 with an incredible come-from-behind victory. She then went on to thrill horse racing fans later that year with a history-making victory in the Belmont Stakes, the third leg of the coveted Triple Crown. Will we see a Las Virgenes Stakes-Triple Crown connection this year?

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