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Rapport wires Victory Ride Thoroughbred Legends Racing Stable's RAPPORT (Songandaprayer) led all the home in Saturday's $100,000 Victory Ride S. (G3) at Saratoga, crossing under the wire a 3 1/2-length winner to give her stable its first graded scorer. The Bob Baffert-trained sophomore ran six furlongs on the fast dirt in 1:09 3/5 under jockey Martin Garcia and paid $6.90, $4.90 and $3.40 as the near 5-2 second choice. Garcia sent Rapport straight to the front from her inside post, and the dark bay filly willingly took command through swift splits of :22, :44 2/5 and :56 2/5. My Jen (Fusaichi Pegasus) has settled on the rail, with Beyondallboundarys (Saint Liam) just to her outside on the backstretch. As Rapport entered the turn, Beyondallboundarys ranged up to her outside and threw down a challenge, but Garcia just asked his filly for a little more run. Rapport responded, drawing away with My Jen and Beyondallboundarys giving chase to take her first stakes victory. "The point was to make her relax because she has a lot of speed," Garcia said. "She looked like the only speed in the race. She just kept going. With a good horse it doesn't matter where they run and she just showed it. She won two times over the (Cushion Track) in California, and then, now, that's the second time that she ran on the dirt and she won. If she can get over the track she can win because she is a really good filly." My Jen managed to get the best of Beyondallboundarys, returning $15.40 and $6.90 as the 22-1 second longest shot in the field while ending the $118 exacta. Beyondallboundarys was worth $3 as the 5-2 third pick and rounded out the $349.50 trifecta. Katy Now (Tiznow), the 2-1 favorite, rallied from the rear but could do no better than fourth to finish the $1,252 superfecta (3-2-7-9). Simply Spiteful (Speightstown) and Worstcasescenario (Forbidden Apple) followed, while Sister Dawn (Indian Charlie) and Touching Beauty (Tapit) dead-heated for the last spot. Kid Kate (Lemon Drop Kid) was scratched. "She ran really well. She got a little tired in the lane. She hadn't run since (suffering her first loss in the Old Hat [G3] in) January," trainer Eddie Kenneally said of My Jen. "Bringing her back in a Grade 3 race was pretty ambitious, but I'm very proud of her performance." Rapport made her stakes debut in the Azalea S. (G3) at Calder last out on July 10, pulling away on the lead during the early going before tiring and fading to fourth on the wire. That race followed a pair of dominating wins against maiden and allowance rivals on the Cushion Track at Hollywood Park, and the dark bay lass now boasts a 7-3-0-0 career mark. She doubled her earnings with this win to $118,644. "She was training really well and she's really fast," Baffert said. "When I saw the :22 first quarter I knew that was easy for her because she is just really fast. She ran so well at Hollywood Park, which is probably the closest synthetic to dirt that we have, that I wasn't worried about the conventional dirt today. In her previous race, she just went way too fast on a heavy track. But she was training well here and worked very nicely in the mud actually. "It was really nice to get a graded stakes win on Travers Day. Just winning on a big day like this you feel like you won a Grade 1. And I gave her out to a lot of the fans earlier, so that was good." Bred in Kentucky by Glencrest Farm LLC, Rapport sold to Legends Racing for $475,000 as a Fasig-Tipton Saratoga Selected yearling. She is out of the winning Irene's Talkin (At the Threshold), who has also produced this season's Gardenia S. (G3) heroine Direct Line (Tiznow); Adieu (El Corredor), winner of the 2005 Frizette S. (G1) and Spinaway S. (G2) as well as the 2006 Delaware Oaks (G2); stakes scorer Speak Wisely (Smart Strike); and dual stakes-placed Clay's Rocket (American Chance), who is herself the dam of Greeley's Rocket (Mr. Greeley), victress of the Crank It Up S. and third in the Mongo Queen S. in her past two.
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