Immersive wins Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies with authority
The win by the Godolphin homebred, who was ridden by Manny Franco, kept her record unblemished after four starts and essentially sealed Eclipse Award divisional honors.
As comfortable as the victory was at the end, trainer Brad Cox said he began to wonder as the field passed the half-mile pole whether the daughter of Nyquist was going to run her race on this sunny but cool California day.
“(I) got maybe a touch concerned that she maybe was not handling the track for whatever reason,” he said. “… Then obviously still looking up at the fractions, I thought this race has to fall apart. Actually, at that point my concern was someone could be coming behind her.”
His nervousness dissipated as quickly as it appeared as he realized that Immersive was drawing clear of her nearest pursuers and the closers were coming far too late to catch her.
Bet down to 2-1 favoritism after opening as the 3-1 second choice in the field of 10, Immersive broke alertly and settled in fourth in the early stages as the Bob Baffert-trained Nooni laid down fast early fractions of 22.00 and 44.99 seconds while opening a clear lead.
Morning-line favorite Scottish Lassie pulled in front of Immersive nearing the far turn and made a move in tandem with Vodka With a Twist to catch and pass the tiring Nooni at the top of the stretch as Franco switched Immersive to the outside and asked his mount to go.
The pair passed the pair approaching the 1/16th pole and then drew clear well before the wire.
Vodka With a Twist put away Scottish Lassie late to hold second by 2 1/2 lengths, while Quickick rallied from last to get up for third, a length clear of Scottish Lassie.
The winner returned $6 on a $2 win bet and keyed a $1 exacta payoff of $24.20.
The victory was Cox’s 11th in the Breeders’ Cup and the second for Franco.
It also pushed Immersive’s earnings past $1.6 million for Godolphin, the global racing operation of Dubai ruler Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, winner of the Eclipse Awards as the top breeder and owner for the past three years.
Godolphin bloodstock director Michael Banahan attributed the operations recent run of success to the sheik’s long-term planning around bloodlines.
“Sometimes we’ve hit peaks and sometimes we’ve hit valleys with them, but the good pedigrees always come back to the fore again,” he said.
“It takes a lot of time and effort to develop those families, but we’re seeing the fruition of it at the moment,” he added. “And we’re in a great lucky vein of form. We’ve seen that the last couple of years.”