Perfect Shirl rocked the Filly and Mare Turf as the 27 to 1 longshot won it in style
For the second year in a row a shocking upset in the Grade 1, $1,818,000 million Emirates Airlines Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Turf on 4 November, 2011 at Churchill Downs.
This time it was Perfect Shirl at 27 to 1 and the Canadian horse got the job done in fine style for trainer Roger Attfield, one of the better trainers in North America and the veteran jockey John Velazquez timed the run to perfection to claim the 1 3/8 mile
event.
It was a really rough run race over the turf course at Churchill Downs, Misty for Me for example broke dead last and throughout had a rough trip, but went on to pull things together and finished really well behind Nahrain in third place under jockey Ryan
Moore for trainer Aidan O’Brien.
The field of 11 horses had nowhere to go in the race because the pack ran so close to each other that the openings were too little to be fully exploited. Shared Account under E Prado looked to part from the lot on numerous occasions but couldn’t find any
day light to initiate her escape.
The 4-year-old daughter of Perfect Soul, out of Lady Shirl by Thats A Nice, Perfect Shirl was coming off a second place finish in the Grade 2 Canadian Stakes at Woodbine on 18 September, 2011, behind the awesome Never Retreat who covered the 1 1/8 mile distance
in 1 minute and 45.13 seconds on the day.
However, hats off to Roger Attfield, he is an amazing trainer who no matter wherever he goes and take his horses no matter in Kentucky or in Canada he can ship them all around as Perfect Shirl did it for him once again after a scintillating run.
It was Dubawi Heights and Dynaslew who flew right after the break and challenged each other right till the far turn while in second Stacelita the favoured one tracked the leader with immense pace.
Perfect Shirl in the end challenged Nahrain in the final strides and edged past him to win the race in 2 minutes and 18.62 seconds.
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