Juddmonte Team Rebounds With Oaks Prospect Bonny South
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Photo: Hodges Photography / Lou Hodges, Jr.
Bonny South wins the Fair Grounds Oaks at Fair Grounds Race Course
Though the sadness of losing Taraz to a catastrophic training injury last month may be slow to pass for her connections, her sometimes workmate Bonny South has given the Taraz team something to cope with the heartache.
Racing March 21 in the $388,000 Twinspires.com Fair Grounds Oaks (G2) at Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots, the Juddmonte Farm-owned 3-year-old filly picked up 100 qualifying points toward the Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1) with an emphatic, come-from-behind 2 1/4-length victory over runner-up Tempers Rising. The victory leaves her as an up-and-coming contender for the Oaks at Churchill Downs, which was postponed early this week from May 1 to Sept. 4 due to COVID-19.
Though she has similarities with Taraz, running style isn't one of them. While Taraz did her best work on the lead, Bonny South's specialty is her closing punch, which was on display Saturday. Still last of six after longshots French Rose and Stop Shoppin Tammy established splits of :24.30, :47.91, and 1:12.66 in the 1 1/16-mile race, Bonny South fanned out widest in the stretch and passed every one of her rivals over the final quarter-mile. She was timed in 1:43.57 on a fast track, paying $14.20 to win.
Those foes included Finite, the 1-5 favorite after winning five straight, who took command in early stretch after stalking the pace, but after ducking to the inside with about an eighth of a mile remaining, weakened to fourth, edged for the show by Antoinette.
The top four finishers earned points toward the Kentucky Oaks, awarded on a 40-20-10 basis for those finishing second through fourth.
Bonny South and Finite—first and second, respectively, on the Oaks leaderboard with 100 and 80 points in the entire series—are daughters of Munnings , who stands for $30,000 at Ashford Stud in Versailles, Ky.
The GII @TwinSpires Fair Grounds Oaks goes to BONNIE SOUTH. Congrats @bradcoxracing, @JuddmonteFarms, @flothejock, and all connections. pic.twitter.com/viVU1gVPOV
— Fair Grounds (@fairgroundsnola) March 21, 2020
Florent Geroux was aboard the winner for Brad Cox, the same owner/trainer combination that teamed to win the $1 million Twinspires.com Louisiana Derby about a half-hour later with Wells Bayou.
"At the end of the day, she's a filly that doesn't want to be rushed off her feet," Cox said. "She's going to come with a run. She's obviously a very, very nice filly that was a workmate to an unbelievable filly that we lost earlier in the year. This filly's just stepped up and really gotten good. When she walked out here today and I was getting ready to hand her to the pony, I was just like, 'Wow.' It looks like she is just getting bigger every day. She's stronger and really moving forward right now."
Geroux was the regular rider for Taraz, who had been considered an Oaks prospect by Cox and owner/breeder Juddmonte Farm. He said he came into Saturday's race with confidence, though he respected the form Finite brought into the race.
"I was hoping she would make maybe a little bit of a step-down," he said of that rival. "And it looked she did today, or maybe ours made a step up, you know, improvement. It looked like she won pretty easy going away.
"It's too bad about the Oaks (timing). It would have been five weeks. Now we'll have to wait a bit longer. But hopefully, she still is running in September."
Bred in Kentucky, Bonny South is the second foal to race from the Tapit mare Touch the Star, who went winless in a three-race career. Her first foal, Cosmic Code (by Into Mischief ), has won 1 of 11 races and $112,567.
"I guess she is in the Kentucky Oaks. We just have to figure out how to get to Sept. 4, I believe it is," Cox said.