Three Witches much the best in the Santa Monica (Ernie Belmonte/Past The Wire)
Mike Willman/Santa Anita Press Box
ARCADIA, Calif.— In her first start for trainer Michael McCarthy, highly regarded Three Witches, idle since the Grade I Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint here on Nov. 4, avoided an early speed duel and rallied to a very impressive 2 ½ length score in Saturday’s Grade II, $200,000 Santa Monica Stakes at Santa Anita. With Flavien Prat collecting his third stakes win of the day, Three Witches got seven furlongs in 1:23.21.
Breaking sharply from post three, Three Witches was immediately engaged by Hot Peppers to her outside, but Prat was able to ease back off the leader leaving the seven furlong chute, get to her outside and was on terms with the leader three furlongs out.
From there, Three Witches cruised to the lead while well within herself around the turn and had a 2 ½ length edge at the five sixteenths pole en route to an easy score.
Originally based at Gulfstream Park with trainer Saffie Joseph, Three Witches, a 5-year-old mare by Into Mischief out of the Tale of the Cat mare Layreebelle, fetched $1.7 million as a Keeneland September Yearling.
Third, beaten four lengths in the Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Sprint, Three Witches was off as the 8-5 favorite among of a field of five older fillies and mares and paid $5.20, $3.60 and $2.60.
Owned by Yuesheng Zhang, Three Witches, a Grade III stakes winner at the same distance two starts back at Gulfstream Park Oct. 7, now has two stakes wins and an overall mark of 9-4-2-2. With today’s top prize of $120,000, she increased her earnings to $417,970.
The lone California-bred in the field, trainer Rafael DeLeon’s Chismosa rallied from last to be second under Tiago Pereira. Off at 7-1, she paid $5.20 and $3.00 while finishing 1 ¼ lengths in front of Kirstenbosch.
The second choice at 8-5, Kirstenbosch, with Hector Berrios up, paid $2.20 to show.
Fractions on the race were 22.99, 45.55 and 1:10.09.
With three wins on the day, Prat pulled into a tie with Juan Hernandez atop the jockey standings with 23 wins through 20 racing days and his eight stakes winners put him four-up on Antonio Fresu.
Live racing resumes at Santa Anita on Friday with first post time at 12:30 p.m.
GRADE II, $200,000 SANTA MONICA STAKES QUOTES
JOCKEY QUOTES
FLAVIEN PRAT, THREE WITCHES, WINNER: “It’s been a great day, I am very grateful.
“You never know, obviously she ran a great race in the Breeders’ Cup (Filly and Mare Sprint) so based on that race, I thought she could run a big race today.”
TRAINER QUOTES
MICHAEL MCCARTHY, THREE WITCHES, WINNER: “She trained very nicely, I can’t say thank you enough to Mr. Yuesheng Zhang and everybody involved with him, for sending her to us. Quite a nice surprise. This filly has trained well all along, a little bit workman like in the morning. We put some blinkers on her a couple of works back and she really stepped up her game. Today I think the big difference was Flavien was able to kind of get her to ease off of Hot Peppers and get outside of her. She found a nice kind of rhythm to get into up the backside, relax, and Flavien called upon her around the turn and she responded.
NOTES: The winning owner is Yuesheng Zhang.
