Baffert ready to get back on the Breeders Cup bandwagon
Published:Any trainer to have won the Kentucky Derby on three different occasions and saddled seven former winners of Breeders Cup races is worthy of respect and Bob Baffert has his sights set on more big-race success this year.
Baffert does not like sending a horse to big races without a chance of victory and this is primarily the reason that he has been without a Breeders Cup runner for each of the last two years.
But he returns mob-handed this year for his biggest ever assault on the Breeders Cup, with ten horses entered overall into nine of the 14 races across the two days at Churchill Downs.
His three biggest hopes appear to be Euroears in the Breeders Cup Sprint, favourite for the Breeders Cup Ladies’ Classic Plum Pretty and odds-on chance Secret Circle in the Breeders Cup Juvenile Sprint.
Euroears was massively disappointing when finishing last on his latest start in a Group One at Belmont Park, but has suggested on the gallops since that this was a one-off blip.
It is 4/1 in the Breeders Cup odds that Euroears wins the 6f sprint and a repeat of the speed displayed over the 5f gallop at Santa Anita recently will make him tough to be beat.
Meanwhile, Plum Pretty heads the market at 2/1 to win the Breeders Cup Ladies’ Classic and was equally as impressive in the speed department on the same Santa Anita gallop.
Plum Pretty won comprehensively in a Group Two on her latest start and this makes her a worthy favourite, although conditions that day were arguably truly in her favour.
Secret Circle is 4/5 to win the Breeders Cup Juvenile Sprint and he has been devastatingly dominant in winning his only two races to date.
