Juveniles Take Spotlight in Saturday’s Florida Sire Stakes

$200K Susan’s Girl, Affirmed Continue Series for 2-Year-Olds
Three Stakes Worth $470,000 in Purses on 12-Race Program
Video: Analysts Nicoletti, Perry Handicap Saturday’s Stakes
Rainbow 6 Jackpot Pool Estimated at $75,000

HALLANDALE BEACH, FL – Juveniles will once again be in the spotlight Saturday at Gulfstream Park with the return of the FTBOA Florida Sire Stakes series to headline a 12-race program featuring three stakes worth $470,000 in purses.

The $200,000 Susan’s Girl for fillies and $200,000 Affirmed, each sprinting seven furlongs, are the middle legs of the $1.2 million FSS series for 2-year-olds by accredited Florida stallions. The series opened with wins by Lennilu in the $100,000 Desert Vixen and Fourth and Central in the $100,000 Dr. Fager Sept. 6.

Though neither winner will be on hand Saturday, with Lennilu being pointed to the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf (G1) and Fourth and Central recovering from a minor setback, the two races drew a total of 24 entries, with the Susan’s Girl attracting an overflow field of 13.

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Arindel’s Grade 3-winning homebred Mythical is the heavy 7-5 program favorite in the Susan’s Girl, facing restricted company for the first time having won three of her first four starts including the Tremont and Adirondack (G3) at Saratoga following an April 17 debut triumph at Gulfstream for trainer Jorge Delgado.

Ken McPeek, trainer of recently retired 2024 Horse of the Year Thorpedo Anna, will be represented by Tilted Shamrock Stables’ Blazing Bridgette, a maiden daughter of Grade 3 winner Uncle Chuck that was third in a Sept. 25 maiden optional claimer Sept. 25 at Aqueduct, beaten five lengths while in for a $75,000 tag.

“She had a good first run. This is a little ambitious … but she’s set to hopefully improve a little bit and it’s a big purse, so why not,” McPeek said. “She’s done everything right. I think she wants a little longer than she’s run already. I think she wants a mile and a sixteenth in the scheme of things, but as a Florida-bred I think it’s a good fit for her.”

Finding Strength and Love Like Lucy, respectively second and third in the Desert Vixen, are back to try again. A stubborn Finding Strength lost the head bob with multiple stakes winner and Group 2-placed Lennilu, while Love Like Lucy – a $300,000 April auction purchase that went off the second choice that day – was another 2 ¾ lengths back.

“Any time you go to a sale and you spend $300,000 for one, especially a Florida-bred, [the Sire Stakes] is pretty much the goal of what you’re trying to accomplish,” said Joe Moran, Head of Bloodstock and Racing for co-owner MyRacehorse. “It was exciting alone to win on debut, but now to be representing in her second stake and having a stakes placing is also nice, as well.”

The Affirmed is a wide-open affair with 11 horses led by John Oxley homebred Strategic Risk, an 8 ¼ debut winner June 7 at Gulfstream that returns to South Florida after a pair of disappointing runs at Saratoga, both in graded-stakes, one each on dirt and turf. His loss in the Aug. 28 With Anticipation (G3) on grass came to subsequent Bourbon (G2) winner Final Score.

While Fourth and Central is out, the Dr. Fager’s second through sixth-place finishers – Camigol, Trelawny, All to Win, May 10 Royal Palm Juvenile winner Squire and I’m Tuff Enough – all return in the Affirmed. Leading the newcomers is Silverton Hill Farm’s Wootun, stretching out from six to seven furlongs off a front-running maiden triumph Sept. 27.

“He’s always been a nice-sized horse, not overly big and not small, just a nice well put together horse. He has gotten a little cheekier since he won,” trainer Heather Smullen said. “He’s a pretty neat horse to be around. He’s got a great mentality. [He’s] not the best workhorse in the world, just does what you tell him to do, but so far that hasn’t fazed him in the afternoons.”

The FSS series concludes with the $300,000 In Reality and $300,000 My Dear Girl Nov. 29 on opening weekend of Gulfstream’s 2025-2026 Championship Meet.

Between the Sire Stakes is the $70,000 Mr. Jordan overnight handicap for 3-year-olds and up going one mile, also on the main track. A group of nine solid veterans has been assembled including 2024 Gulfstream Park Mile (G2) winner Steal Sunshine, 2024 Holy Bull (G3) winner Hades, 2023 Super Derby winner Big Data, stakes winners Lure Him In and Classic of Course and Lightning Tones, who upset Hades in the Aug. 30 Black Diamond Cat overnight handicap.

The Susan’s Girl (Race 8), Mr. Jordan (Race 10) and Affirmed (Race 11) are all part of the 20-cent Rainbow 6 sequence, which begins in Race 7. Unsolved Friday, the first racing day following multiple mandatory $1,872.46 payouts Oct. 12, the jackpot pool is estimated at $75,000.

Notes: Jockey Miguel Vasquez raised his Sunshine Meet-leading total to 22 wins with a Friday double aboard One Sweet Girl ($17.20) in Race 2 and Etendre ($4) in Race 8 … Jockey Leonel Reyes moved closer to a career milestone with a victory aboard Neonate ($27.40) in Race 4 Friday, his 991st North American win. Reyes was a two-time national champion and won more than 1,400 races in his native Venezuela before coming to the U.S. in 2016.