WO Oaks Stakes- $500.000 Purse
WO- For Fillies Three Years Old Foals in Canada
One Mile and an Eighth on the Dirt
June 14, 2015

Heading into this years WO Oaks, Mb Stables had won the last two races.  Last year with Distinguished, and the year prior with Carnegie Steel.  With the late scratch of Toronto Candy, the trainer’s chances certainly looked good for extending the winning streak given he had three of the seven entries.  But none of his entries had that particularly glowing resume.  Angelic Appeal came into the race as the only filly to have won more then $100.000 in her career, and no one would deny that she was a very good racehorse.  Attempts to race her against graded company had not yielded the same results.  It’s amazing how different a horses past performances can look after the race when you tack on a win in a $500.000 stake, and that’s actually what Angelic Appeal was able to do with her victory.   Now, she’s a winner of 4 out of 5 this year, and career earnings are over $400.000.  Mb Stables has won many accolades over the course of his career, but a three race winning streak in a race that has this high of a purse, well, that’s not too shabby of an achievement, either.   Aboard the winner was R Bejarano, and it is his second career win the in stake, having also ridden Carnegie Steel.  The ending race time was 1:49.10, just .02 off the stake record, so maybe that can erase some questions that might have lingered about whether or not this was a strong enough field for the purse in which it offered.  Congratulations to the connections, let’s see now how it all went down!

1st- 6- Angelic Appeal (2/1)- The eventual race winner wasted no time getting up on the race lead out of the starting gate, having the field cleared by about a length and a half for the run into the first turn.  She handled this gracefully, and set the opening half mile in :48.02 for Mb Stables.  She picked it up a bit over the backstretch run, setting the 3/4 time in 1:11.76, still with a 1-2 length advantage over second.  Exiting the turn, she still seemed to be in good shape, but the closers were coming, and she was tiring.  The mile time was clocked in 1:36.24, and in the final furlong, the pressure from Unsecured and Rhaella picked up.  They made a strong attempt to get the win, but Mb’s cheering for the wire to hurry up and get there would pay off the challengers would run out of time and Angelic Appeal would hold on for the win!   Angelic Appeal is a three year old filly that was bred by and owned by Mb Stables.  She is by Square Edge and out of Funafuntasia.  Congratulations again!

2nd- 7- Unsecured (4/1)- After watching President Ebola get off to a poor start in the Plate Trial Stakes which immediately preceded this, Team 7 Illusions was hoping not for a repeat when Unsecured went straight to the back of the pack.  Hopefully this time, he would get a close out of his closer.  He would get it.  As the field went into the final turn, J Alvarado urged his filly to get closer, and she would begin making up ground.  Only until the final furlong did it seem like she actually might beat Angelic Appeal, as along the way, she did well to split Tightrope and You Better Run.  Matched strides with Rhaella in the stretch to give us a thrilling finish at the end.  Perhaps if she had been on the rail, and not Rhaella, for the stretch, we could be talking about a different winner.

3rd- 5- Rhaella (5/1)- J J Castellano opted to reel in the Night Mare Racing filly, putting her well off their early fractions being set by the front runners.  Encouraged her forward a little more in the turn, and this seemed to intensify when Unsecured, who had been behind her, also seemed to be hitting her best stride.   Charged hard along the rail, matching strides with Unsecured, and would just miss in the end, and also be nipped for second.  An impressive performance, and hopefully she can build off of this in the future.

4th- 3- Tightrope (6/1)- It was a good start for this second Mb Stables trained entry, riding along the rail in the early stages about a length or two from the lead and enjoy a bit of a gap to the fourth place runner.  Maintained second throughout the turn and R Albarado moved her to the rail to try and get a good run on Angelic Appeal.  Showed some fight in the stretch, but could not threaten the winner, or hold off two of the closers.

5th- 4- You Better Run (22/1)- The longest shot on the board from Cajun Stables got off to a fairly strong start, assuming a second place stalking position behind the race leader in the opening turn.  Remained third for much of the race, and battled well to hang in there in the stretch.  But that’s all it seemed as though she was doing at this point as she did not have anything for Angelic Appeal.

6th- 8- Bright Vision (9/2)- The final entry from Mb Stables did not start all that well, about eight lengths behind her stablemates.  However, this tends to be customary for her.  Tried to advance with Unsecured in the backstretch, and for a while she was able to accomplish this.  She could not keep it up and eventually her progress would tail off.

7th- 2- Trail Mix (6/1)- Started better then she finished for Rfjr Racing, but even so she was still about 4-5 lengths from the lead at the start.  Maintained this position until the closers that had been behind her decided that it was time to go.  When this happened, Trail Mix had no response, and would finish a distant last.

Track: Fast
Time: :48   1:11³  1:36¹  1:49

$2 Mutuel Prices:

$1 Exacta: 6 – 7 Paid 7.30
$1 Trifecta: 6 – 7 – 5 Paid 27.20

Scratched: Toronto Candy(L)

— NS

Categories: Ungraded