For the first time since the inception of the Spinaway S. in 1881, the camera could not split the top two, as Sweet Loretta and Pretty City Dancer arrived on even terms, a result allowed to stand following a stewards' inquiry.
Pretty City Dancer, an $825,000 Keeneland September yearling, entered the race as the most-experienced of the septet, with three previous efforts under her belt, including a smart 3 1/4-length success in the July 2 Debutante S. at Churchill Downs. Sweet Loretta, the second most-expensive of her sire's weanlings to sell in 2014, parlayed a seven-length Monmouth graduation into a 4 1/4-length defeat of Fun (Harlan's Holiday) in this track's GIII Schuylerville S. July 22 in which she took advantage of a suicidal pace. The bettors went for the 'other' Pletcher runner, 'TDN Rising Star' Cherry Lodge, off that one's big-figure debut success, but the two Tapit fillies had the race–and the ensuing drama–to themselves.
Runway Doll (Majestic Warrior) took them along early on with Cherry Lodge perched out three wide as the slow-starting Sweet Loretta and Pretty City Dancer settled a bit further back in the field. Sweet Loretta improved her position rounding the turn and was a menacing presence from third while Pretty City Dancer raced in her wake, but turned the heat up on the top two at the quarter pole. Sweet Loretta was able to work her way past her stablemate just outside the eighth pole, but Pretty City Dancer kept plugging away and earned a share of the victory on the wire. Or so it appeared. Head-on footage revealed that the top two exchanged multiple bumps in the waning strides, but no action was ultimately taken. The win gave St. Elias Stable a remarkable sweep of the four major 2-year-old filly stakes (Astoria–Bode's Dream; Schuylerville, Spinaway–Sweet Loretta; Adirondack–Nonna Mela).
“To be honest, I thought we got beat at the wire because my filly got tired the last part,” Sweet Loretta's jockey Javier Castellano admitted. “But she responded all the way to the end. I am very proud of how she did it today.”
Added Mark Casse, trainer of Pretty City Dancer, “I thought she was going to get there and then she kind of laid in. I never really saw the head-on, but I thought we won and then I thought we got beat. Then I met up with Todd and he said, 'Will you take a dead-heat?' and I said, 'I'll take a dead heat.' So that's what we got.
Pedigree Notes:
Pretty City Dancer, whose half-sister Lear's Princess (Lear Fan) famously defeated GI Belmont S. winner Rags to Riches (A.P. Indy) in the 2007 GI Gazelle S., is out of an unraced mare who was hammered down to Gainesway for $160,000 in foal to Stormy Atlantic out of the Palides Investments dispersal at Keeneland November in 2011. Pretty City Dancer, the most expensive of her leading sire's yearling fillies to sell in 2015, has a full-brother who is consigned by Gainesway as hip 565 to the upcoming Keeneland September sale. Pretty City was most recently bred to Gainesway inmate and GI Breeders' Cup Mile winner Karakontie (Jpn).
The Lyster family's Ashview Farm acquired Sweet Loretta's stakes-placed dam for $240,000 at the 2012 Keeneland September sale and visited Tapit in her first year in the breeding shed. Produced on the same Storm Cat cross as champion Hansen, Sweet Loretta is kin to a yearling colt by Tapit and a filly foal by Street Sense. Ithinkisawapudycat, a half-sister to Sovereign Award-winning 2-year-old filly Spring In the Air (Spring At Last) and from the family of MGSW & GI Kentucky Derby runner-up Tejano Run, was most recently bred to Constitution.
Saturday, Saratoga
SPINAWAY S.-GI, $350,000, SAR, 9-3, 2yo, f, 7f, 1:24.18, ft.
(DH)-1–&SWEET LORETTA, 122, f, 2, by Tapit
1st Dam: Ithinkisawapudycat (SP), by Bluegrass Cat
2nd Dam: Unbridled Run, by Unbridled
3rd Dam: Royal Run, by Wavering Monarch
($750,000 Wlg '14 KEENOV). O-St. Elias Stable; B-Ashview
Farm, LLC & Colts Neck Stables, LLC (KY); T-Todd A. Pletcher;
J-Javier Castellano. $140,000. Lifetime Record: 3-3-0-0,
$250,520. Werk Nick Rating: A+++. *Triple Plus*. Click for
eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.[bullet ad=”ashview-co-bredraisedsold”][bullet ad=”crupi-trained”][bullet ad=”kbif-g1″](DH)-1–@&PRETTY CITY DANCER, 120, f, 2, by Tapit
1st Dam: Pretty City, by Carson City
2nd Dam: Pretty Special, by Riverman
3rd Dam: Snobishness, by Forli
($825,000 Ylg '15 KEESEP). O-John C. Oxley; B-Gainesway
Thoroughbreds Ltd. (KY); T-Mark E. Casse; J-Irad Ortiz, Jr..
$140,000. Lifetime Record: 4-3-0-1, $229,700. *1/2 to Lear's
Princess (Lear Fan), GISW, $491,870. Werk Nick Rating: A+.
Click for eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree.[bullet ad=”gainesway-consigned-by”][bullet ad=”gainesway-hip-565″][bullet ad=”kbif-g1″]3–Cherry Lodge, 118, f, 2, Bernardini–Wilshewed, by Carson
City. ($450,000 Ylg '15 KEESEP). 'TDN Rising Star' O-Gainesway Stable (Antony
Beck); B-Mrs. William L. Currin (KY); T-Todd A. Pletcher.
$35,000.[bullet ad=”valkyre-stud-foaled-raised-sold”][bullet ad=”gainesway-purchased”]Margins: 5 3/4, 5 3/4, 2 3/4. Odds: 3.75, 4.80, 1.00.
Also Ran: Fun, You Know Too, Runway Doll, Special Risk.
Click for the Equibase.com chart, the TJCIS.com PPs or the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree for Sweet Loretta or for Pretty City Dancer. VIDEO, sponsored by Fasig-Tipton.
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