Pamela Ziebarth’s Sweet Azteca and jockey Juan Hernandez win the $200,000 Great Lady M Stakes Saturday, July 6, 2024 at Los Alamitos Race Track, Cypress, CA. The four-year-old home-bred daughter of Sharp Azteca set a new track record covering the 6 1/2 furlongs in 1:14.33. (Courtesy of Benoit Photo)
Sweet Azteca won the strongest race of the Los Alamitos’ early-summer thoroughbred season Saturday like a filly who could make waves in a bigger spot at Del Mar this fall.
Ridden by Juan Hernandez, the odds-on favorite powered away from the other Grade I winner in a good field to win the $200,000, Grade II Great Lady M Stakes by five lengths in a track-record 1:14.33 for 6 1/2 furlongs.
The time beat by .15 of a second the mark held for eight years by Finest City, a promising omen because that Great Lady M champion went on to win the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare sprint at 8-1 odds later in 2016.
Trainer Michael McCarthy said in the winner’s circle that the Great Lady M was “plan B” after Sweet Azteca missed a run on the Kentucky Derby undercard because she’d gashed a knee in her stall. McCarthy was happy to see the gray daughter of Sweet Azteca and So Sweetitiz continue her year-long improvement by winning from behind pacesetter Daddysruby.
“The race didn’t play out the way I thought it would,” McCarthy said. “I figured she would go ahead and establish herself (on the lead), but it was nice to see her be able to sit off that filly.”
Four-year-old Sweet Azteca (who paid $3.40), coming off an upset of Adare Manor in the Grade I Beholder Mile at Santa Anita, won for the fourth time in five career starts for owner Pamela Ziebarth.
Daddysruby, the Grade I La Brea winner at Santa Anita in December, held on for second. Super Shine got up for third after a terrible start. Olivia Twist, a 37-1 shot, was fourth.
The three-week Los Al meet ends Sunday.
Kyle Frey leads the jockey standings comfortably with seven wins to Edwin Maldonado’s five and Armando Ayuso’s four. Frey has five mounts Sunday, two morning-line favorites, and Ayuso has six. Maldonado rides at Pleasanton.
The trainer standings are a tie, with four wins apiece, among Bob Baffert, Steve Knapp, Peter Miller, Sergio Morfin and Jorge Periban. Baffert has no horses entered at Los Al on Sunday, but Knapp has six and Miller, Morfin and Periban two each.
The short-priced winner in the Great Lady M, Saturday’s final race, dashed hopes for a three-day carryover in the pick-six. It paid $272,293 for $2 to the holder of one winning ticket.
Elsewhere, Saturday was a disappointing for California-based 3-year-olds. Santa Anita Derby winner Stronghold and jockey Antonio Fresu finished second, and E.J. Won the Cup and Mike Smith were fourth, behind front-running winner Dragoon Guard and Florent Geroux in the Indiana Derby. Endlessly and Umberto Rispoli ran last to Trikari and John Velazquez in the Belmont Derby on turf at Aqueduct.
