Welcome to a look back at the first day of the 40th Breeders’ Cup, otherwise known as Identity Crisis Friday. When it was unveiled in 2009, it was first offered as a second, very lesser Novelty Day, then later on as Ladies’ Day, and for the last six years as a sort of Babies’ Day, aka Future Stars Friday, which is wishful thinking but sounds a lot better than Quick Recoup of Investment Day.
A very grand total of 58 foals of 2021 took part in the five races at Santa Anita Park on Breeders’ Cup Friday, Nov. 3, compared to the 94 runners spread across the nine Breeders’ Cup contests for the Saturday program. That should tell the racing world something, although I’m not sure what.
As for “future stars” among the best of the Friday runners, the spotlight henceforth will be squarely on Mike Repole’s Fierceness , who turned the 1 1/16-mile Breeders’ Cup Juvenile (G1) into a one-horse show with a 6 1/4-length romp under John Velazquez. Repole bred the son of City of Light and thought he had a perfect sequel to Forte ‘s score in the same race in 2022, especially after Fierceness won a Saratoga Race Course maiden race by 11 1/4 lengths. When the colt sunk in the slop of the subsequent Champagne Stakes (G1), the bandwagon emptied. Too soon, as it turned out. Fierceness went off at 16-1, while favored Pletcher stablemate Locked finished third, just back of local hopeful Muth .
As a racehorse, Justify started late and might have left the stage too early, retired as he was not long after becoming an undefeated Triple Crown winner in 2018. By way of apology, he has set about the difficult task of replacing himself many times over as a breakout stallion who took charge of the Friday program with winning daughters in a brace of 2-year-old events.
First came Just F Y I in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies (G1), who disposed of heavily favored Tamara early in the stretch of the mile and one-sixteenth, then held fast to fend off Jody’s Pride to win by a neck. Junior Alvarado, as usual, was aboard for Bill Mott and the owner/breeder, George Krikorian.
Krikorian’s movie house business took a hit from the Covid shutdown, and his industry has yet to recover, no matter how many crowd-pleasers like “Oppenheimer” and “Barbie” come along. But how about “Killers of the Flower Moon,” the latest excursion into darkest America from Martin Scorsese? Isn’t that packing them into his coast-to-coast Krikorian chain?
“It’s not doing that well,” Krikorian said the morning before the Future Stars Friday, as he entered the Santa Anita backstretch for a late morning stroll. “And now because of the actors and writer strikes, a lot of big movies have been pushed all the way to 2025.
“Right now this is where I want to be,” Krikorian added. “I’ve never really done this before, spent a lot of time during Breeders’ Cup just watching the horses get ready. I’m really enjoying myself.”
Just F Y I and Junior Alvarado after winning the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies
As for Mott, his presence in the winner’s circle after a Breeders’ Cup 2-year-old event was a man-bites-dog kind of headline. On the day before the Juvenile Fillies, he was asked if he recalled ever even hitting the board.
“Let me think,” Mott said, which can be the prelude to a long pause. Then he lit up. “Take Me Out! He was second in the Juvenile.”
That was 1990. In fairness, though, before Friday only 15 of Mott’s 120 Breeders’ Cup runners had been 2-year-olds. The trainer was almost apologetic in explaining why Just F Y I was the exception to the stable trends, summing up by saying, “She was the one who brought us along.”
Chad Brown, on the other hand, feasts at the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf (G1T) like a man possessed. Hard to Justify (by you-know-who) provided Brown with his sixth winner in the 16 runnings of the mile on grass. She won by a half-length under Flavien Prat, who lost a tough one aboard Jody’s Pride, and for a few strides it looked as if Brown’s former assistant, Cherie DeVaux, would be second with She Feels Pretty , the mild favorite. Then Ireland’s Porta Fortuna got up in the last jump to snag the place.
Porta Fortuna could have given Donnacha O’Brien his first Breeders’ Cup win. Tough beat. It was up to the old man then—pater Aidan O’Brien—to save the family honor in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf (G1T) with Unquestionable , a son of Wootton Bassett . The victory, by 1 1/2 lengths over Coolmore stablemate Mountain Bear , was another nice piece of swooping late drama from Ryan Moore. My Boy Prince was an admirable third, but there was the distinct possibility that it could have been an Aidan 1-2-3 had morning-line favorite River Tiber not been a vet scratch that morning. (On a sober note, Mountain Bear pulled up with a non-displaced condylar fracture, according to veterinary officials.)
Unquestionable wins the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf
Finally, they could have saved the airfare and hotel bills and just run the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf Sprint (G1T) at Ascot or the Curragh for all the difference it might have made. In holding off the longshots Valiant Force and Starlust , Big Evs proved he was just fast enough to survive the chase through a :43.65 opening half-mile (not a typo), giving trainer Michael Appleby and jockey Tom Marquand their first Breeders’ Cup victories.
Among the top three—separated by a half and three-quarters—only third-place Starlust had ever taken a bend in competition, and he was ready for anything. He had turned left to win at Chelmsford and right to win at Kempton, both times going six furlongs on the all-weather, but it wasn’t quite good enough.
Big Evs, on the other hand, had never raced beyond a straightaway five furlongs in a five-race campaign that began last May at Redcar, the Santa Anita of North Yorkshire. Racing began there in 1872 (not a typo), and during both World War I and World War II the course was used by the RAF as an airstrip and the grounds as a military encampment.
This should be noted because Big Evs is not only the first Breeders’ Cup winner to make his debut at Redcar, but likely the last. Unless, of course, Big Evs can emulate 2020 Juvenile Turf Sprint winner Golden Pal and come right back next year to win the Breeders’ Cup Turf Sprint (G1T) at Keeneland.
Don’t put it past him.
