Zipse: Thorpedo Anna faces long odds for horse of the year

Working Saturday morning over Saratoga’s Oklahoma training track, Thorpedo Anna gave every indication of being primed and ready to turn in another stellar performance against her female counterparts. Saturday’s Grade 1 Coaching Club American Oaks at Saratoga will be the occasion, as the daughter of Fast Anna looks to open an insurmountable lead in the race for a 3-year-old filly championship.

Thorpedo Anna has been so impressive in winning her three starts this year, she raises the thought of being not only a likely winner of an Eclipse award in her division but also as a candidate to be the 2024 horse of the year.

For those rooting for her, a sophomore filly winning American racing’s top award is not unprecedented, but the odds are very much stacked against her.

First things first, however, for the Kenny McPeek-trained dark bay. Before she can become a possible candidate for the horse of the year title, she must continue her dominance against other sophomore fillies.

With jockey Brian Hernandez Jr. back in the saddle, Thorpedo Anna turned in her fourth and final workout between her most recent impressive victory and a scheduled start in the $500,000 Coaching Club American Oaks. Moving in company with the recent runner-up of the Ohio Derby, Gould’s Gold, and piloted by the only jockey who has ever ridden in her a race, the star filly looked on the muscle as she rolled through the five-furlong tightener in 1:01.55.

Held in check by Hernandez throughout, the young millionaire broke off slowly before quickening rapidly while never being allowed to leave her talented male stablemate behind.

In the historic Coaching Club American Oaks, Thorpedo Anna is expected to face some of the best of the rest in the 3-year-old filly division in Leslie’s Rose and Candied. Both of the Todd Pletcher-trained fillies are Grade 1 winners in their own right, but on paper, they are strictly running for second-place money.

That’s how good the division leader has been in winning her first three starts of 2024. Untouchable down the lane in all, Thorpedo Anna has won the Fantasy Stakes (G2) at Oaklawn, the Kentucky Oaks (G1) at Churchill Downs, and the Acorn Stakes (G1) at Saratoga with disdainful ease. Each win came by four lengths or more as she cruised effortlessly to the wire.

Another Grade 1 victory on Saturday would strengthen her credentials, but as far as the horse of the year race, the CCA Oaks likely would do little to sway voters to believe that a 3-year-old filly is the most deserving horse in the land.

Fair or not, racing against their own is looked upon as a level below the best, and the humans appointed to make the call are exceedingly unwilling to name a sophomore filly as the horse of the year.

As I said, it has been done before, but it has become one of the rarest feats in American racing.

In 1945, Busher joined Beldame, Regret and Twilight Tear as the fourth sophomore filly to be recognized as the horse of the year in the first half of the 20th century. In the 78 years since, however, only one filly has been outstanding enough to take home the award.

For Thorpedo Anna to be awarded the honor, she will need to do something really special. Something that is above and beyond what is accomplished by the normal champion filly. To start with, she will need to face and defeat males.

The first filly in 85 years to win the middle jewel of the Triple Crown, Rachel Alexandra did much more in her magical season than win the Preakness. The 2009 horse of the year not only dominated fellow fillies five times with victories in the Martha Washington Stakes, Fair Grounds Oaks (G2), Fantasy Stakes (G2), Kentucky Oaks (G1) and Mother Goose (G1), but she beat males on three occasions.

After defeating the soon to be 3-year-old male champion Summer Bird easily in the Haskell (G1) at Monmouth Park, the sensational daughter of Medaglia d’Oro became the first filly in history to beat males in the prestigious Woodward Stakes (G1) at Saratoga. For the season, Rachel Alexandra won all eight of her starts, with the final five coming in important Grade 1 races.

Currently, the 4-year-old National Treasure, who has won a pair of Grade 1 races this year in the Pegasus World Cup and Met Mile, is the leader of this year’s horse of the year race. The Bob Baffert-trained runner is scheduled to make his next start in Saratoga’s Whitney (G1) in early August.

A strong finish to the season would make the son of Quality Road a hard horse to deny, but it’s entertaining to look ahead and speculate about such an exciting young horse as Thorpedo Anna.

What would the star 3-year-old filly need to do the rest of the year to be a serious contender for the horse of the year award? History has taught us that she would need to do plenty to have any chance at all, but for now I look forward to Saturday’s Coaching Club American Oaks to see what she can do next.