Only a trainer as successful as Bob Baffert can win a Grade II race and then bemoan the fact his other horse didn’t run better.
That was the case Saturday at Los Alamitos, a track Baffert holds dear to his heart after launching his career there with quarter horses before switching to thoroughbreds full-time in 1991.
Baffert sent out Nothing Like You, the 2-1 third choice in the wagering, for an impressive 5 1/4-length victory in the $200,000 Grade II Starlet over 29-1 longshot Great Forty Eight, who was disqualified and placed fourth for interference in the stretch. Flynn’s Chance (17-1) was moved up to second and Chatalas, the 9-5 co-favorite, was placed third in the race for 2-year-old fillies.
It was Baffert’s seventh consecutive victory in the Starlet and a record 10th overall. He’s won the race seven of the 10 years the race has been run at Los Alamitos. It was formerly known as the Hollywood Starlet when run at Hollywood Park (1981-2013).
“I thought my other filly (Grazia, co-favored at 9-5) would be on the lead,” Baffert said after watching Nothing Like You travel gate to wire under Juan Hernandez to post her third victory in six starts and pad her earnings to $237,160 with the winner’s share of $120,000. “Unfortunately Grazia didn’t run well. We were taking a chance with her running two turns.”
Grazia, an Uncle Mo filly, went into the 1 1/16-mile race off a 3 1/4-length victory going one turn in her debut at Del Mar on Nov. 12. Flavien Prat rode Grazia after Hernandez elected to retain the mount on the winner.
Nothing Like You, a daughter of Malibu Moon, won her third consecutive race after losing the first three starts of her career. Hernandez has been aboard for her past four races.
“She’s improving with every race,” Hernandez said. “A distance is what she has always wanted. She relaxed perfectly. I let her go at the head of the stretch and she took off.”
It was only Nothing Like You’s second try around two turns. She broke her maiden going a mile at Santa Anita on Oct. 14. She set fractions of 23.24, 47.40 and 1:12.20 en route to a final clocking of 1:44.78, the slowest Starlet since the Baffert-trained Streaming won the final edition at Hollywood Park in 1:44.96 and the second slowest ever.
“She was pretty fresh today because I’d backed off on her a little bit because I’d just run her at Del Mar (a victory in the Desi Arnaz Stakes on Nov. 10),” Baffert said. “Juan said she popped out of there and he said nobody wanted the lead so he just took it. Once I saw her on the backside with that long stride you could tell she was in control of the race.”
Baffert agreed with Hernandez’s assessment that Nothing Like You needed more ground to show her real talent.
“It took her a while to come around,” he said. “She wasn’t real quick. We knew once we stretched out that would be her game. The longer the better for her.”
Baffert’s other Starlet victories at Los Alamitos began with Dream Tree in 2017 and followed with Chasing Yesterday, Bast, Varda, Eda, and Faiza last year.
