Monmouth Oaks Attracts Lucrezia, Delaware Oaks Fillies

With many tracks in the Mid-Atlantic located within a short drive of one another, stakes races in that region can draw some of the same competitors, vanning from one opportunity to the next.

The $200,000 Monmouth Oaks (G3) at Monmouth Park Aug. 1 is an example, having lured the top six finishers from the July 4 Delaware Oaks (G3) at Delaware Park: winner Project Whiskey, runner-up Dream Marie, and third-place Princess Cadey—plus Piece of My Heart, Hopeful Growth, and Comical, fourth through sixth, respectively.

Yet the Fair Hill Training Center-stabled Lucrezia might start as the favorite in the nine-horse lineup. A two-time stakes winner at Tampa Bay Downs this winter, she finished a well-beaten fourth in the June 20 Longines Acorn Stakes (G1) at Belmont Park behind winner Gamine, one of the leading 3-year-old fillies in the country. She pressed Gamine through fractions of :22.48, :45.28, and 1:09.33 before retreating to lose by 27 lengths in the mile race that was timed in a stakes-record 1:32.55

"She came back well from the race at Belmont," trainer Arnaud Delacour said. "It didn't really set up the way we wanted. There was a lot of pace."

The filly shoots for her first graded stakes victory in the 1 1 /16-mile Monmouth Oaks, which offers qualifying points on a 50-20-10-5 scale to the first four finishers toward the Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1) Sept. 4 at Churchill Downs.

Lucrezia is the leading points earner in the race with 55, ranking 10th on the Kentucky Oaks leaderboard. She earned 10 points in winning the Feb. 8 Suncoast Stakes at Tampa, added 40 more with a runner-up finish to Swiss Skydiver in the March 28 Gulfstream Park Oaks (G2), and then gained five more in the Acorn.

"At the moment, it's one race at a time," Delacour said of the Kentucky Oaks. "It came up disappointing in the Acorn. I hope she can redeem herself and run a good race, and then we'll see. If she's really doing well, we'll consider it."

The 3-year-old daughter of Into Mischief  is owned by Edward Seltzer and Beverly Anderson, who bred her in Kentucky with Krista Seltzer. Paco Lopez rides.

Project Whiskey is one of two grade 3 winners in the field, the other being Comical, who captured the Schuylerville Stakes (G3) at Saratoga Race Course last summer. The latter is winless in eight starts since, though she has placed in three other stakes. Two of those placings came in grade 1s last year when trained by Doug O'Neill for a different set of owners.

Another daughter of Into Mischief now owned by WinStar Farm, Lindy Farms, and Madaket Stables, Comical has unsuccessfully chased Monmouth Oaks entrants Lucrezia, Piece of My Heart, and Project Whiskey in victories by those fillies this year.

Hall of Fame trainer Steve Asmussen has given the riding assignment to Hector Rafael Diaz Jr. 

Matthew Williams, 24, bids for his first stakes victory as a trainer with Dream Marie, who was beaten just a half-length in the Delaware Oaks. A native of Jamaica and a trainer since 2018, he has five horses based in South Florida owned by his family’s Miracle's International Trading stable.

"She made a really big run in the Delaware Oaks," Williams said. "I thought she was going to win coming out of the turn, but Project Whiskey really dug in."

Entries: Monmouth Oaks (G3)

Monmouth Park, Saturday, August 01, 2020, Race 11

• Grade III
• 1 1/16m
• Dirt
• $200,000
• 3 yo Fillies
• 5:31 PM (local)

PP	Horse	Jockey	Wgt	Trainer	M/L
1	1Dream Marie (KY)	Joe Bravo	115	Matthew J. Williams	9/2
2	2Princess Cadey (KY)	Jomar Torres	119	Claudio A. Gonzalez	6/1
3	3Market Rumor (KY)	Carlos J. Hernandez	115	Ian R. Wilkes	12/1
4	4Hopeful Growth (KY)	Antonio A. Gallardo	115	Anthony R. Margotta, Jr.	6/1
5	5Piece of My Heart (FL)	Nik Juarez	119	McLean Robertson	7/2
6	6Lucrezia (KY)	Paco Lopez	119	Arnaud Delacour	4/1
7	7Comical (KY)	Hector Rafael Diaz, Jr.	115	Steven M. Asmussen	6/1
8	8Project Whiskey (MD)	Jorge A. Vargas, Jr.	121	Robert E. Reid, Jr.	6/1
9	9Eve of War (KY)	Christopher P. DeCarlo	115	Todd A. Pletcher	10/1