Serengeti Empress to Make Final Start in Breeders' Cup
Image:
Description:
Photo: Skip Dickstein
Tom Amoss (right) with Serengeti Empress after winning the Ballerina Stakes at Saratoga Race Course
Serengeti Empress, the winner of the 2019 Longines Kentucky Oaks (G1) and 2020 Ballerina Stakes (G1), is scheduled to make her final start in the Nov. 7 Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint (G1) at Keeneland before she is retired and bred to Into Mischief next year, trainer Tom Amoss said.
The 4-year-old daughter of Alternation comes off a second in the Sept. 5 Derby City Distaff Stakes Presented by Derby City Gaming (G1) at Churchill Downs. She battled for the early lead and stubbornly proved difficult for Bell's the One to pass before being edged by a nose in a head-bobbing finish.
It was her second consecutive race at seven furlongs. The other was the Ballerina at Saratoga Race Course. Seven furlongs is also the distance of the Filly & Mare Sprint.
Video
"I'm looking forward to one more race with her," Amoss said at Keeneland Oct. 9.
A winner of seven of 18 starts and more than $2 million for owner Dr. Joel Politi, Serengeti Empress also captured the Azeri Stakes (G2) this year at Oaklawn Park in her customary frontrunning manner.
Politi, an orthopedic surgeon, does not wish to sell his prized filly, according to Amoss. She gave him his first stakes win as an owner when she took the Ellis Park Debutante Stakes two years ago at Ellis Park and numerous memories since.
"I tried to get him to sell her, but he said, 'Tom, if 10 years from now she never produces a good baby and I can walk out in a field and pet her, she doesn't owe me anything,'" Amoss said.
Next year she will visit the hottest sire in North America. Into Mischief tops the general sires list, led by the $3 million in earnings this year from Kentucky Derby Presented by Woodford Reserve (G1) winner Authentic. Into Mischief's stud fee was recently raised to $225,000 from $175,000 for the 2021 breeding season by Spendthrift Farm.
Bred in Kentucky by Tri Eques Bloodstock out of the Bernardini mare Havisham, Serengeti Empress was purchased by Politi for $70,000 from Brookdale Sales' consignment at the 2017 Keeneland September Yearling Sale.
She has breezed twice since the Derby City Distaff, working a half-mile in :48 3/5 Sept. 25 at Churchill Downs and another half-mile in the same time Oct. 2.