Cicero Farms

Sunday's closing day card at Del Mar was punctuated by a trio of impressive graded stakes performances, however, none more so than the final graded race of the seaside oval's season, the GIII Bayakoa Stakes. Attempting to defend her title in the one-mile race after a narrow score in 2024, Hope Road (Quality Road) rebounded off a modest third-place effort as the even-money choice in the GI Breeders' Cup Filly & Mare Sprint to take Sunday's Bayakoa, winning by an emphatic 6 1/2-length margin. Hustled out of the gate by...

The bargain purchase of a Blame filly 10 years ago has yielded Ron and Barbara Perry's Cicero Farms a pair of GI Ballerina Stakes victories, but when Marley's Freedom produced a colt in 2024, the Perrys made the decision to go to market. The yearling by Uncle Mo (hip 34) will go through the sales ring during the first session of the Keeneland September Sale Monday with the VanMeter Sales consignment. "I want to be sure he has the best opportunity to be a superstar," Barbara Perry said of the...

During July and August--the height of the summer racing season--graded races happen at a fast and furious rate. With 44 graded events at Saratoga alone added to another 13 tracks conducting at least one graded race during the two-month span, it's a dizzying time to follow top racing on the continent. We break down the main takeaways from the season. Two dozen of the 95 graded races in July and August were contested at the top level, or Grade I. Seventeen of those Grade Is were at Saratoga (or nearly...

It's not often a Grade I-winning mare recreates her success in her offspring, but seven years after her dam was prima ballerina at the Spa, Hope Road (Quality Road) sailed home convincingly in the GI Ballerina Stakes to take home her first elite level victory. Hope Road was last seen May 26 running third in the GIII Winning Colors Stakes at Churchill Downs and before that hit the board against Grade I company for the first time May 3 in GI Derby City Distaff when fellow California girl MGISW Kopion...

Cicero Farms homebred Hope Road (Quality Road) rolled in the GIII Torrey Pines Stakes at Del Mar on Saturday afternoon and proved her two prior five-length wins for trainer Bob Baffert were no fluke. Beginning in the care of John Sadler, last summer at the seaside oval the then-juvenile was the runner-up twice against maiden special weights before being well-beaten in the GI Del Mar Derby. Making the barn switch in September, the filly broke through with a strong performance at Santa Anita in mid-June to start her 3-year-old season...

1st-SAR, $136k, Msw, 2yo, 1 1/16mT, post time: 1:10 p.m. ET His full-brother Mage is about three hours south at Monmouth Park to contest Saturday's GI TVG.com Haskell S., but DORNOCH (Good Magic) could still represent the family should the Saratoga opener be transferred to the main track. Whereas Mage cost $235,000 at Keeneland September in 2021 (before fetching $290,000 at the Fasig-Tipton Midlantic Sale last year), Dornoch was a $325,000 acquisition in Lexington. The pair's dam SW & GSP Puca (Big Brown), a 'TDN Rising Star' and also responsible...