Bast (Uncle Mo) Winning Gr.2 Santa Ynez at Santa Anita

Bast Adds Grade II To Resume in 2020 Debut

Champion 2-Year-Old Filly finalist Bast (3f Uncle Mo x Laffina, by Arch) entered 2020 the same way she exited 2019 – as a graded stakes winner with a victory in the Grade II Santa Ynez Stakes on Sunday to earn 10 points on the Kentucky Oaks trail.

Cutting back to seven furlongs, Bast unsurprisingly went off as the favorite in her 3-year-old debut. The filly broke sharply and raced wide under jockey Drayden Van Dyke just behind the leaders. Van Dyke gave Bast her cue to move in the turn and with a furlong left to go she joined the leaders.

Once she safely had her head in front, Van Dyke was able to put his whip away and let the filly sail home 1 3/4 lengths in front.

Owned by Baoma Corporation, Bast led home the trifecta for trainer Bob Baffert. A three-time Grade I winner last year with her only graded stakes loss a third in the Grade I Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies, Bast was named a finalist for the Champion 2-Year-Old Filly on Saturday.

“She came out of the Breeders’ Cup (Juvenile Fillies) well. She’s a picture of health and that’s why we ran her today,” Baffert said about the filly making her third start in two months. “She was doing really well, she looks great and I just hate training them too long they could get hurt in the mornings. As long as they are doing well and you enter them, the more races you get into ’em it is better for them.”

Bred by BlackRidge Stable, Bast was a $200,000 weanling purchase from the Keeneland November Sale and then went on to sell for $500,000 as a yearling. She is the first foal out of Laffina, a half-sister to Grade II winner Mananan Mclir and two other stakes winners with her sisters producing Grade I winner Fault and Grade II winner Fioretti among their eight stakes horses.

The leading sire of his generation, Uncle Mo’s success as a stallion continued in 2019 with 11 stakes winners including six graded stakes winners. With a promising crop of juveniles representing him, he finished third on last year’s Two-Year-Old Sire rankings.