There’s a gentle, end-of-season glow settling over Del Mar, the kind that feels almost nostalgic, and into that familiar warmth steps Hope Road — a filly who seems to breathe differently when she’s back on this dirt. This track has shaped some of her finest moments, and as she gears up for the Bayakoa Stakes 2025, she carries more than strong form. She returns with the quiet air of a horse who still has something left to prove, adding a touch of emotion and anticipation to Sunday’s final stakes race of the year.
The daughter of Quality Road has always looked at home at Del Mar. She won the Bayakoa last season, the highlight of a four-race win streak that included a dominant five-length success in the G3 Torrey Pines and a 5¼-length allowance win, both over this track. This year, Bob Baffert sent her into deeper company, and she rewarded that confidence by finishing in the money in all four of her 2025 starts, headlined by a commanding victory in the G1 Ballerina at Saratoga in August. She returned here earlier this month for the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint and, though favourite, finished a solid third behind stablemate Splendora and Vahva. “She ran well,” Baffert said, noting that she tired late but had since rebounded strongly. “She’s come back and worked very well and I expect a big effort out of her today. She’s just a very good filly.”
But Hope Road’s bid for a second Bayakoa title will not go unchallenged. Simply Joking ships in from Kentucky for her second start under Michael McCarthy, a filly who burst onto the scene with two stakes wins at Fair Grounds before finishing a close second in the G2 Fantasy at Oaklawn Park. That run earned her a place in the Kentucky Oaks, though she finished last of 13, and her first start for McCarthy — ninth in the G2 Raven Run — did little to clarify her ceiling. Still, her trainer remains trusting of her ability, insisting that Keeneland run can be dismissed and praising the way she has trained since.
Warming adds further intrigue after scoring in the G3 Autumn Miss at Santa Anita last month on turf but switching to dirt for this assignment. With limited options for straight three-year-olds, Alice Clapham, assistant to Graham Motion, explained that the stable chose Del Mar after the filly breezed impressively twice on the surface. “Because she was here and she was doing well we thought we’d take a shot and see how she handles it,” she said, adding that the timing of this race made the decision feasible.
Lemon Muffin, once the late D. Wayne Lukas’ Kentucky Oaks hope, brings a different sort of story. After Lukas’ passing she moved briefly to Rodolphe Brisset before heading west to join Paddy Gallagher, for whom she will make her first start on Sunday. Her presence adds a thread of continuity in a field full of horses finding new footing at the end of the season.
The race itself honours Bayakoa, the Ron McAnally mare who dominated the older-female division in 1989 and 1990, earned two Eclipse Awards and later entered the Hall of Fame. Fittingly, Sunday’s renewal — Race 8 on a nine-race closing-day card with a probable 4 p.m. post — gathers a field hoping to emulate even a fraction of her legacy. From the rail outward, the entrants are Deep Blue (Armando Ayuso, 20-1), Mahina (Umberto Rispoli, 12-1), Simply Joking (Flavien Prat, 6-1), Hope Road (Juan Hernandez, 3/5), Lemon Muffin (Mike Smith, 12-1), Precise Timing (Antonio Fresu, 20-1), Home Game (Kazushi Kimura, 12-1), Warming (John Velazquez, 8-1) and Jane Austen (Abel Lezcano, 15-1). As the field lines up, all eyes turn to Hope Road, the mare who made Del Mar her stage and now returns to try and leave it with one more defining moment in the Bayakoa Stakes 2025.
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