Stardom Bound Out of Triple Crown Picture
Triple Crown hopeful filly Stardom Bound had a close call last Saturday in the Santa Anita Oaks. She was forced to run wide down the stretch and barely won by a nose. It was not the performance that Michael Iavarone and IEAH Stables was expecting, and unless something dramatically different were to happen in the next two months Stardom Bound will continue to race against fillies. Her objective the first weekend in May at Churchill Downs will now be the May 1 Kentucky Oaks.
“She didn’t take a significant lurch forward,” Iavarone said Monday morning. “We didn’t see enough for her to take on the boys, especially the quality of the boys who will be in the Santa Anita Derby, like Pioneerof the Nile.”
She will also switch from the Grade 1, $750,000 Santa Anita Derby on April 4 to the Grade 1 Ashland Stakes at Keeneland.
“If she were to run a race in the Ashland that would blow our minds, I guess we could re-discuss it, but right now, the Kentucky Oaks is the goal,” Iavarone said. “We want to get her as good as we can get her. We think she can do better. It’s strange to walk away initially disappointed from a race in which she wins her fifth Grade 1 in a row, and have to explain why she didn’t bury the field. Are we seeing the other 3-year-old fillies step up dramatically, or are we staying the same or slightly regressing? We need to understand why we’re not seeing her leap forward.”
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