Distance Doesn’t Faze Chilukki

Vivid Angel and Excellent Meeting won the Oak Leaf Stakes for trainer Bob Baffert in 1997 and 1998, then couldn’t duplicate those wins in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies. Excellent Meeting’s mistake was to be foaled in the same year as Silverbulletday, who beat her stablemate by half a length in the Breeders’ Cup.

Baffert, who occasionally mentions Silverbulletday and Chilukki in the same sentence, will get another chance to nail down an Oak Leaf-Breeders’ Cup parlay. Chilukki won Saturday’s $200,000 Oak Leaf at Santa Anita, extending her undefeated streak to six races, and she’ll be favored when the $1-million Juvenile Fillies is run at Gulfstream Park on Nov. 6.

“She’s like Silverbulletday, she takes her tracks with her,” said Baffert, referring to Chilukki’s six wins at Churchill Downs, Del Mar and Santa Anita. The one-mile Oak Leaf was her first race at Santa Anita, and her first start around two turns. She covered the distance in 1:36, more than a second faster than either Vivid Angel or Excellent Meeting in the same stake.

The Juvenile Fillies will be 1 1/16 miles, a distance that’s of no concern to either Baffert or his jockey, David Flores, who has ridden the filly for owners Bob and Janice McNair in four races.

“If she’d run this in 1:37 or something, then I might have been worried [about added distance],” Baffert said. “One good thing about this race is that she showed us she doesn’t need the lead to win.”

Flores practically guaranteed a win in Florida.

“I don’t think any horse can beat her now,” he said.

After a stewards’ inquiry, they ruled that Chilukki’s move to the rail inside the sixteenth pole wasn’t flagrant enough to negate her 1 1/4-length win. Abby Girl, who finished second with Chris McCarron, had to change paths, but had already been passed by Chilukki.

“As soon as my filly makes the lead,” Baffert said, “she thinks it’s over. She came in a little, but she’s just green. [Flores] told me he could have taken the other filly any time he wanted to, but my filly has never been in a fight and when she makes the lead, she puts the brakes on.”

Earning $120,000, Chilukki paid $3 to win. The McNairs bought the daughter of Cherokee Run (the 1994 Breeders’ Cup Sprint winner) and Song Of Syria earlier this year for $875,000.

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Another win by the Baffert-trained Forest Camp, in today’s Norfolk Stakes, will cement the favorite’s role for Aaron and Marie Jones’ colt in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile.

New York’s 2-year-old male division turned into a conundrum after Saturday’s $400,000 Champagne at Belmont Park, where Greenwood Lake, 11 lengths behind after six furlongs, won by 2 1/2 lengths while the more highly regarded Chief Seattle, High Yield and More Than Ready weren’t good enough. Chief Seattle finished second, High Yield was third and More Than Ready, the 7-5 favorite, was fifth.

Greenwood Lake, ridden by Jean-Luc Samyn for trainer Nick Zito, paid $15.60 after winning his second race in four starts. Last time out, in his stakes debut, Greenwood Lake was beaten by a neck in the Belmont Futurity by Bevo, who has been injured and is out for the year. Greenwood Lake’s time for 1 1/16 miles was 1:43 3/5.

Horse Racing Notes

At Keeneland, where steady rain turned the grass course soggy, California shipper Kirkwall sprang a 25-1 upset in the $400,000 Keeneland Turf Mile and Perfect Sting, the 8-5 favorite, won the $500,000 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup for owner-breeder Frank Stronach. Kirkwall, trained by Bobby Frankel and ridden by Victor Espinoza, had won only two of 11 starts in the last two years, including a seventh-place finish in the Eddie Read Handicap at Del Mar in August.

Stronach missed winning another $500,000 race by a nose when Golden Missile, who was 4-5, couldn’t overhaul Super Sound in the Hawthorne Gold Cup Handicap in suburban Chicago. . . . At Calder, Son Of A Pistol, shipped in from Santa Anita, ran second, 1 3/4 lengths back, as Silver Season won the $300,000 Smile Sprint Handicap. . . . Christmas Boy, winner of the Bing Crosby Handicap at Del Mar, was injured training for the Smile Stakes and is out for the year.