Keeneland: Chop Chop scores in scratched-down Bewitch

Lexington, Ky.

A minor cut to a hind leg took three-time defending winner War Like Goddess out of Friday’s Grade 3, $290,125 Bewitch Stakes before the closing-day card got started at Keeneland.

“It definitely softened it up a little bit,” trainer Brad Cox said after his 4-year-old filly Chop Chop (3-1) seized the opportunity. She rated from mid-pack before Axel Concepción took her to the lead in the stretch en route to a 2 1/4-length victory in the 1 1/2-mile turf race for older fillies and mares.

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It was the first graded-stakes win for owner Jerry Bach’s daughter of City of Light. In a 15-race career, Chop Chop has won two stakes on turf, one on synthetic last month in the Latonia at Turfway Park and took second in the Alcibiades (G1) on the Keeneland dirt 18 months ago.

Still, it was the absence of trainer Bill Mott’s three-time Grade 1 winner War Like Goddess that loomed in the post-race conversation.

“It was a little bit of a surprise to see she was out,” Cox said. “We ran against who we had to run against. She ran as well as she could, and the result was a victory.”

When War Like Goddess was in the mix, Chop Chop was 15-1 on the morning line. She wound up being the third choice at post time.

With two other scratches leaving a field of six, Chop Chop broke alertly from the rail post on a course that was rated firm. While Lovely Princess (5-2) set the early pace before fading to finish last, Concepción said his target was the pace-stalking favorite Vergara (3-2).

“I was just taking my time on the backside following (Vergara),” said Concepción, 19, the 2023 Eclipse Award-winning apprentice jockey who won for the first time in a Keeneland stakes. “I was just taking my time on the backside.”

Lovely Princess took the tightly bunched field through early fractions of 25.53, 49.67 and 1:14.29 in the afternoon drizzle on a windy, 71-degree day. Flavien Prat rode 5-year-old Vergara into second place and then a brief lead taking the two path through the third of three turns. Concepción never let her get away, seizing the lead with a tailwind in the last three furlongs.

“I felt like I had a lot of horse,” Concepción said. “At the three-eighths (pole), I just followed (Vergara), and at the top of the stretch, she just gave me all.”

Chop Chop extended her lead, but not without a late challenge from Germany-bred 5-year-old Atomic Blonde (4-1). Newly named Hall of Fame jockey Joel Rosario moved her forward from last place into second with a furlong left, but she just did not have enough to overcome Chop Chop.

“She looked like she came back in good form today,” said Rosario, who eased the Christophe Clément-trained mare when she bled in the Nov. 12 running of the Long Island (G3) at Aqueduct.  “She was finishing up for me at the end, so she’d done well.”

After leading through a mile in 1:39.34 and 1 1/4 in 2:04.06, Chop Chop won with a time of 2:27.80. She paid $8.92, $4.80 and $3.16. Second-place Atomic Blonde returned $4.80 and $3.16. Third-place Vergara, who was another 4 1/2 lengths back, paid $2.64 to show. Tower Bridge (9-1), Tic Tic Tic Boom (31-1) and Lovely Princess finished fourth through sixth in that order. As was the case with War Like Goddess, both Commandandcontrol and Queens Command were trainer scratches.

The victory lifted Chop Chop’s record to 15: 4-5-2. Adding Friday’s $183,675 first prize, the filly who cost Bach’s Selective operation $230,000 at a Fasig-Tipton sale in July 2021 has earned $880,152.

Cox said this win opened doors that made him unsure what Chop Chop’s next race would be. She was not even certain to run in this race.

“Honestly I was pointing her for either the mile race (Churchill Distaff Turf Mile, G2) or the mile-and-an-eighth race (Modesty, G3) Derby week at Churchill,” he said. “I nominated her to this, and I really didn’t say anything to the owner until the morning of entries (last Friday). I said, ‘Let’s just enter and take a strong look at this. If it comes up, and we like it, the mile-and-a-half might open up.”

Even if War Like Goddess had not hurt herself, Cox said Chop Chop was coming Friday.

“Yeah, we were running. We were running,” he said. “I just hadn’t collected enough information on the Derby-week races to think it was going to be any easier. I felt let’s just give her a shot. She’s been stabled here. She’s had two works here on this turf course. Let’s give her a shot and see what happens.”

The race was started in 1962 and named for Bewitch, Calumet Farm’s two-time champion mare who was retired in 1951 and inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1977.