Affirmative Lady scoring the Gulfstream Park Oaks. (Lauren King)
Second of Three $100,000 Stakes on Sunday, Aug. 4 Program
David Joseph/Maryland Jockey Club
LAUREL, Md. – Mo Speed Racing’s Grade 2 winner Affirmative Lady, unraced since finishing 11th in the Kentucky Oaks (G1) last spring, is set to make her highly anticipated return to competition for new connections in Sunday’s $100,000 Caesar’s Wish at Laurel Park.
The 1 1/16-mile Caesar’s Wish for fillies and mares 3 and up is the second of three $100,000 stakes on a nine-race program, joined by a pair of scheduled grass events – the 1 1/16-mile Searching for 3-year-old fillies and 1 1/8-mile Bald Eagle Derby for 3-year-olds.
First race post time is 12:25 p.m.
By 2023 Hall of Famer Arrogate, at $210,000 Affirmative Lady was one of the first yearlings purchased by London-based football agent and businessman Kia Joorabchian’s AMO Racing USA, for whom she made seven starts over two seasons with a record of 2-1-2 and became his first domestic graded-stakes winner in the April 2023 Gulfstream Park Oaks (G2).
From there it was on to Kentucky, where Affirmative Lady hesitated into a crowded first turn and was never in contention. After going to the sidelines and changing hands, both in ownership and trainers from Graham Motion to Michael Stidham, she returned to the work tab in March at WinStar Farm and since mid-May with Stidham’s string at Delaware Park.
“She was bought out of a sale and sent to us. We’re very lucky to get a filly that’s a Grade 2 winner as a 3-year-old. She had some time off and we brought her up to this race,” Stidham said. “We’re just hoping to get her back started. Anytime you go from your 3-year-old year to running against older horses, that’s always a test. She’s trained well, so we’re hoping she can handle the step up against older horses.”
Stidham has been impressed with Affirmative Lady, who shows nine timed breezes at Delaware for her comeback, six of them bullet works, the most recent being a half-mile move in 48.60 seconds July 27, second-fastest of 62 horses. She is 2-0 at the Caesar’s Wish distance.
“She’s just a very athletic, willing filly in the morning. She does everything the right way,” Stidham said. “She’s breezed really well and we’re anxious to get her back to the races and see where we fit.”
Julio Hernandez, who ranks among Delaware Park’s leading jockeys and is 4-for-18 at Laurel’s summer meet, comes in to ride from Post 8 in a field of nine.
“It looks like in her races from last year she tended to be a stalking type,” Stidham said. “So, I think she’ll be in that stalking position, hopefully, and be able to finish from there.”
Looking to win the Caesar’s Wish for a third straight time is trainer Brittany Russell, who captured the 2022 and 2023 editions, both contested at one mile, with Hybrid Eclipse. This year she’s back with Michael Ryan’s claimer-turned-multiple stakes winner Saddle Up Jessie.
Taken for $20,000 out of a Santa Anita maiden claimer in January 2023 and moved to Russell, Saddle Up Jessie promptly graduated by 17 ½ lengths in a six-furlong waiver claiming spot last June at Delaware. The 5-year-old More Than Ready mare became a stakes winner in the 1 1/8-mile Carousel last December at Laurel and began 2024 beaten a neck in the Jan. 6 Ladies before winning the Feb. 10 Heavenly Prize Invitational, both at Aqueduct.
Saddle Up Jessie has gone winless in her last four starts, three of them in graded company, the most recent a runner-up finish behind Honor D Lady in the 1 3/16-mile Delaware Handicap (G2) despite a troubled start where she was bumped at the break.
“She ran well,” Russell said. “We’ve really tested this filly. She’s a stakes winner, obviously. [We were] trying to get some graded type on her form, and mission accomplished. She ran second to a really good filly. We were delighted with her effort.
“I always had the Del Cap on my radar, being a graded-stakes and the fact that she likes Delaware,” she added. “But, it’s a tricky distance and you don’t know how they’re going to handle it. I’m happy to get her back home at a distance she should enjoy.”
Saddle Up Jessie has a record of 3-1-1 from seven tries at 1 1/16 miles and has two wins and a second in three prior starts over Laurel’s main track. She drew Post 8 under Russell’s husband, jockey Sheldon Russell, at co-topweight of 124 pounds.
“I’m looking forward to getting her back home,” she said. “Maybe it’s a little bit of an easier spot versus sort of what she’s been facing. I’m just kind of hoping that she runs as well as she’s been, because I think she’s been in pretty good form considering what she’s been running against.”
Pine Brook Farm’s Foggy Night is entered to make her second start off the layoff in the Caesar’s Wish after finishing sixth in a 6 ½-furlong allowance July 8 at Parx, her first race since late October. Trained by Robert E. ‘Butch’ Reid Jr., the 4-year-old Khozan filly won the Delaware Oaks (G3) and Cathryn Sophia and was second in the Monmouth Oaks (G3) during a sophomore campaign where she ran first or second in five of seven starts.
ZWP Stable, Inc. and Non Stop Stable’s Malibu Beauty is a four-time stakes winner, twice at Laurel, that is entered to come back just 11 days following a one-mile allowance victory at Delaware Park along with Gary Capuano-trained stablemate Intrepid Dream, a Paul Fowler Jr. homebred that won the one-mile Heavenly Cause April 13 at Laurel.
Evidencias, a Group 1 and Group 2 winner in her native Brazil that has gone winless in six North American starts for trainer Christophe Clement; 2023 Susquehanna Valley winner Majestic Creed; multiple stakes-placed Continentalcongres; and Lexa complete the field.
The Caesar’s Wish debuted in 1978 at old Bowie Race Course and was held at both Pimlico and Laurel before it was renamed the Beyond the Wire for 2018. Returned to the stakes schedule in 2021, it honors the Maryland-bred mare that won 11 of 16 starts over two seasons including the 1978 Mother Goose (G1) and Black-Eyed Susan (G2) and 1977 Demoiselle (G2) and Villager (G3) and was inducted into Maryland’s Thoroughbred Hall of Fame in 2018. Her winning time in the Mother Goose broke Hall of Famer Ruffian’s stakes record and stood until 1994.
