Stakes Advance: Moonlit Garden Seeks Second Stakes Victory in Tiffany Lass Stakes
By Ryan Martin
Town and Country Racing’s Moonlit Garden will go for her second career stakes victory when she takes on six other fillies and mares in the $75,000 Tiffany Lass Stakes.
Breaking from the rail as the 5-2 second choice for the mile and 70 yard event, the 4-year-old daughter of Malibu Moon won the Summer Colony Stakes at Saratoga two starts back and gave trainer Chris Davis his first stakes victory when doing so. Last time out, she was a well-beaten sixth in the Grade III Turnback the Alarm Stakes at Aqueduct.
“She’s doing as well as she’s ever done,” Davis said. “She handles this racetrack great and the cutback in distance won’t hurt her. I’d throw the last race out, she shipped up there and she had bar shoes on. She had a minor setback and we got those taken off. She’s doing super. Her last three breezes have been unreal so hopefully she put everything back together and get us another stakes win.”
Moonlit Garden has banked a total of $210,573 in a 17-race career where she has won three starts. Other than her Summer Colony Stakes win, she broke her maiden this past March over a sloppy Fair Grounds Race Course & Slots main track. Her next start was a victory against winners in a first level allowance event over a fast main track at Keeneland. She will be ridden by Ricardo Santana, Jr.
Gainesway Stables’ Shenandoah Queen is the 9-5 morning line favorite for the Tiffany Lass. The 6-year-old daughter of Henny Hughes will be making her first start for the barn of two-time leading trainer Brad Cox. She was previously conditioned by John Sadler and was third in the Grade I Zenyatta Stakes at Santa Anita two starts back. While racing on the west coast, she was a two-time winner of the Tranquility Lake Stakes at Del Mar. In a career of 22 starts, she has made six trips to the winner’s circle and has acquired a total of $258,610. She will be guided by Joe Bravo.
Rounding out the field are Frost Wise (post three, 8-1, Channing Hill), Auspicious Babe (post four, 6-1, Edgar Morales), Hey Niki (post five, 12-1, Corey Lanerie), Diamondcoat (post six, 15-1, James Graham), and America’s Tale (post seven, 7-1, Colby Hernandez).
The Tiffany Lass Stakes is named in honor of Aaron Jones’ homebred who won the Grade I Kentucky Oaks in 1986. Trained by Lazaro Barerra, the daughter of Kentucky Derby winner Bold Forbes campaigned for her Oaks victory at the Fair Grounds, where she won all four of her starts over the New Orleans oval, including the Fair Grounds Oaks (then a Grade III).
