Kentucky Oaks Trainer and Jockey Quotes

Sep 04, 2020 Churchill Downs Communications

LOUISVILLE, KY (Friday, Sept. 4, 2020) –

KENTUCKY OAKS TRAINER QUOTES

Brad Cox (Shedaresthedevil, winner) – “This is why you wake up every morning to get to win races like this. This filly has been really impressive coming into the race and when she breezed with Monomoy Girl a couple weeks ago, we knew how well she was training. These were some tough fillies in the Oaks this year with Swiss Skydiver and Gamine. We are so thrilled to win a race like the Oaks, again, in our backyard. This has been a phenomenal day with Monomoy Girl winning the La Troienne then winning the Oaks with Shedaresthedevil. These are the days you dream of.”

Kenny McPeek (Swiss Skydiver, second) – “She ran super. That other filly (Shedaresthedevil) has been training extremely well. I’ve been watching her. Tyler (Gaffalione) rode her good. That’s horse racing. There’s no guarantees. She’s been training super. I actually wasn’t as worried about Gamine as I was about another filly running a bang-up race. That’s what happened.”

Bob Baffert (Gamine, third) – “She just didn’t have it. Turning for home, she was in a good spot and she was late switching leads and she never does that. I don’t know if she just got tired or whatever. But down the backside he couldn’t have been any better, he was in the perfect spot. She just didn’t have it there.”

“That other filly (Shedaresthedevil) was just latched on her the whole way. We were hoping to just go easy around there. But she didn’t want to switch leads or anything. I kept waiting for her to just scoot away from that filly but she just didn’t have it. She just got beat.”

“She hadn’t gone long and we can always second guess ourselves. Maybe I should have run her longer or whatever. But the winner was tough, you have to give her credit.”

KENTUCKY OAKS JOCKEY QUOTES

Florent Geroux (Shedaresthedevil, winner) – “She had a great trip. She broke very sharp and I was able to stalk Gamine all the way. That was the plan, but sometimes plans don’t always work out. Perfect plan today. The only question was whether or not I was going to be able to run her down. My filly ran an amazing race. It’s been an amazing day.”

Tyler Gaffalione (Swiss Skydiver, second) – 'She finished up nicely. She just wasn't good enough today. Huge effort from the winner. Hat's off to the connections. I thought there'd be a little more speed. It kind of set up like I thought, but they slowed it down. My filly was tracking in a nice position; she was comfortable where she was. We had every shot turning for home. We had a quarter of a mile to get there. Just second-best today.'

John Velazquez (Gamine, third) – 'Maybe it's a little too much, going two turns. I don't know. She never really got an easy lead, either. She was pressured the whole way. But that's horse racing. You can't let them do it too easy, either.'