Perfect Alibi Goes for Second Grade 1 in Alcibiades

Off a rail-riding victory in the Sept. 1 Spinaway Stakes (G1) at Saratoga Race Course, Tracy Farmer's Perfect Alibi tops a field of 11 2-year-old fillies in the $400,000 Darley Alcibiades Stakes (G1) Oct. 4 at Keeneland.

Friday's 1 1/16-mile event serves as the featured race on opening day of the fall meet and as a Breeders' Cup Challenge Series race, awarding the winner a fees-paid berth into the Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies (G1) Nov. 1 at Santa Anita Park. Trainer Mark Casse said the World Championships is the plan for the Sky Mesa  filly if all goes well.

Perfect Alibi was a debut winner in May at Churchill Downs, running away with a five-furlong maiden special weight by 9 1/2 lengths. She made her stakes debut in the Astoria Stakes at Belmont Park, missing the winner Maryanorginger by three-quarters of a length, before going 2-for-2 at the Spa.

In the Aug. 4 Adirondack Stakes (G2), Perfect Alibi dropped back to fifth before getting up for a half-length victory. She then came back with an impressive 1 1/4-length score in the Spinaway, her longest race yet at seven furlongs. The dark bay/brown filly rallied from sixth, made a drive up the rail, and pulled clear of favorite Frank's Rockette despite late bumping.

"She's got a lot of grit. I thought that was extremely professional for a young 2-year-old filly," Casse said of Perfect Alibi's Spinaway win. "She's a big filly, too. We always kind of felt getting a route of ground with her is what she wanted. She's almost 17 hands tall. She's really amazed me that she's run as well as she has going short.

"The first time we ran her, I told Mr. Farmer that I thought it would take her a little while to get going and that she would probably come running and hopefully she'd finish third or fourth, and she won by (almost) 10. She just always kind of amazes me."

Farmer purchased Perfect Alibi for $220,000 from Denali Stud's consignment to The Saratoga Sale, Fasig-Tipton's selected yearling sale in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., in 2018. The filly was bred in Kentucky by Pin Oak Stud out of the stakes-winning Maria's Mon mare No Use Denying, who also produced Sky Classic Stakes (G2T) runner-up Noble Thought. All five of the mare's foals of racing age are winners.

Perfect Alibi has hardly put a foot out of place on the track in the afternoon so far, and she'll receive her next test going two turns for the first time in the Alcibiades.

"You really don't know if a horse can run two turns until you run them," Casse said. "Hopefully, we're going to answer that question on Friday, and I hope we like the answer."

Casse will also saddle Chiefswood Stables' homebred Western Taffy, an Ontario-bred Candy Ride  filly who has made two starts at Woodbine. The trainer has been impressed by Western Taffy since she broke her maiden July 13 on the Tapeta course, stalking the pace before winning by 1 3/4 lengths going five furlongs.

In the Aug. 17 Catch a Glimpse Stakes—a 6 1/2-furlong prep on turf and her stakes debut—the chestnut filly finished second, 7 1/2 lengths behind Fair Maiden. Casse felt turf might not be Western Taffy's preferred surface, and she returned to the work tab Sept. 1 on Woodbine's dirt training track and worked a bullet five furlongs in :58 3/5.

"She worked phenomenal on the dirt, which led us to bring her there," Casse said of the Alcibiades entry.

Casse has won the Alcibiades three times, scoring with Heavenly Love (2017), My Conquestadory (2013), and Spring in the Air (2012.)

Godolphin's homebred Micheline is the only other stakes winner in the field and will make her dirt debut in the Alcibiades. The Michael Stidham trainee earned her maiden win second time out when taking the one-mile Sorority Stakes on Monmouth Park's grass Sept. 1. That followed a third-place effort in a 1 1/16-mile Saratoga maiden also on the turf.

Micheline is by Bernardini  and out of the Include  mare Panty Raid, winner of the Juddmonte Spinster Stakes (G1) at Keeneland and American Oaks Invitational Stakes (G1T) at Hollywood Park in 2007.

Entering off a runner-up stakes effort is Agave Racing Stable and Rockin Robin Racing Stable's Spitefulness. The Palace Malice  filly made her first two starts on Presque Isle Downs' synthetic track, breaking her maiden second time out with trainer Timothy Hamm, before she was sold and moved to Phil D'Amato.

Spitefulness was seventh in the Aug. 18 Ellis Park Debutante Stakes, her dirt debut, after coming in at the start. When back on a synthetic track in the Sept. 7 Arlington-Washington Lassie Stakes, she took the lead after stalking the pace the first quarter-mile and finished second, three-quarters of a length behind Mom's Red Lipstick.

"It was a nice performance. She opened up many lengths and acted a little green in the stretch. So we are putting blinkers on her and stretching her out a little bit further from seven-eighths to a mile (and a sixteenth)," D'Amato said. "Traditionally, if you look at the last couple runnings of the Alcibiades, horses coming out of the Lassie have done really well."

Spitefulness is the first foal out of the Tale of Ekati  mare Ekati's Phaeton, winner of the Davona Dale Stakes (G2).

Entries: Darley Alcibiades S. (G1)

Keeneland, Friday, October 04, 2019, Race 9

• Grade I
• 1 1/16m
• Dirt
• $400,000
• 2 yo Fillies
• 5:30 PM (local)

PP	Horse	Jockey	Wgt	Trainer	M/L
1	1Gone Glimmering (KY)	James Graham	118	Thomas M. Amoss	15/1
2	2Three D Flag (KY)	Ricardo Santana, Jr.	118	Steven M. Asmussen	20/1
3	3Spitefulness (KY)	Tyler Baze	118	Philip D'Amato	20/1
4	4Alandra (KY)	Joel Rosario	118	Claude R. McGaughey III	5/1
5	5Micheline (KY)	Brian Joseph Hernandez, Jr.	118	Michael Stidham	8/1
6	6British Idiom (KY)	Javier Castellano	118	Brad H. Cox	4/1
7	7Perfect Alibi (KY)	Jose L. Ortiz	118	Mark E. Casse	5/2
8	8Heir of Light (KY)	Julien R. Leparoux	118	Norm W. Casse	5/1
9	9Sequin (KY)	Tyler Gaffalione	118	Wesley A. Ward	12/1
10	10Western Taffy (ON)	Florent Geroux	118	Mark E. Casse	6/1
11	11How Ironic (KY)	Corey J. Lanerie	118	Victoria H. Oliver	20/1