Covfefe Makes History With Pair of Eclipse Awards

The special ones only come around so often, and Covfefe is special. The game filly with the big blaze proved to be one of a kind in 2019 when she was named champion 3-year-old filly and champion female sprinter. She's the first to earn both awards in the same season.

The closest comparison is Racing Hall of Fame entrant Xtra Heat, who was the top 3-year-old filly of 2001 but was second to champion Squirtle Squirt in the sprint championship voting that year. The female sprinting division got its own award the following season.

Bred by Alexander-Groves Thoroughbreds, Covfefe was a $250,000 purchase at the 2017 Keeneland September Yearling Sale by Alex Solis II and Jason Litt for LNJ Foxwoods, the racing team of Larry, Nanci, and Jaime Roth. 

Precocious at 2, Covfefe developed afterburners at 3. After a seasonal tuneup at Keeneland in April, Covfefe delivered perhaps the most impressive effort of the year in the Adena Springs Miss Preakness Stakes (G3) at Pimlico Race Course, lowering the 29-year-old six-furlong track mark by more than a second (1:07.70).

"I'll never forget standing in the grandstand, looking at the fractions, and thinking … and then listening to Dave Rodman's call of the race. I think he used the term 'super filly,'" trainer Brad Cox said. "It was amazing to watch, but watching her train leading up to that last year, it was believable. She's special."

Covfefe, named for an errant Tweet from President Donald Trump, delivered two additional performances that sparked her championship run. At Saratoga Race Course, she went head to head in the lane with Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1) winner Serengeti Empress before prevailing by a half-length in the seven-furlong Longines Test Stakes (G1). 

"She did all of her preliminary training at Churchill, and we put her on the plane four days before the race," Cox said. "I was pretty confident we were going to get an 'A' effort out of her. For her to win was no shock at all because, again, she's an amazing talent."

A leg-stretching effort in the seven-furlong Dogwood Stakes Sept. 21—which resulted in an eight-length score at Churchill Downs—set her up for the coup de grace in the Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1), where she fought off the rallying Bellafina to win by a half-length. That score, along with a sophomore filly division without a standout in the two-turn affairs, paved the way to the pair of Eclipse Awards.

"For a filly to win the 3-year-old championship, that's a championship that's going to come through the Kentucky Oaks, the CCA Oaks, the Acorn (all grade 1), races like that," Cox admitted. "The thing that separates her is her pure dominance in a couple of her races, the ease she won with, and the two grade 1s: one against the Kentucky Oaks winner and one against older horses on the other side of the country."