Fansided

Songbird migrates to Saratoga to run in the C.C.A. Oaks

By Liz O'Connell

Oct 31, 2015; Lexington, KY, USA; Mike Smith aboard Songbird goes on to win race three of the 2015 Breeders Cup Championships at Keeneland. Mandatory Credit: Richard Mackson-USA TODAY Sports
Oct 31, 2015; Lexington, KY, USA; Mike Smith aboard Songbird goes on to win race three of the 2015 Breeders Cup Championships at Keeneland. Mandatory Credit: Richard Mackson-USA TODAY Sports /
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Songbird alights at Saratoga Race Course for the Coaching Club American Oaks and the track is atwitter.

Eclipse Award 2015 champion 2-year-old Filly Songbird arrived in Saratoga Springs Wednesday evening, first flying into Albany International Airport, then hitching a ride in a horse van to the track. In the horse racing equivalent of Airbnb, the Fox Hill Farm-owned filly is staying in a comfortably bedded stall in trainer Wesley Ward’s shedrow.

Songbird is undefeated in eight career starts.  She’s California-based in Jerry Hollendorfer’s barn at Santa Anita and has proven the top 3-year-old on the West Coast. Songbird’s last foray east was for the 2015 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies held at Keeneland Race Course, Lexington, Kentucky, where she ran the best 2-year-old fillies in the country  into submission.

To lure Songbird to Saratoga, the New York Racing Association upped the purse of the 1 1/8 mile C.C.A. Oaks from $300,000 to $500,000. It worked, Songbird is confirmed to run on Sunday, June 24. Four fillies are confirmed to take her on: graded stakes placed Flora Dora and Mo d’Amour, and Carina Mia and Weep No More who are both formidable in their own right, owning at least one Grade1 stakes victory each.

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