FILLY IS UP TO GOOD IN WINNING THE SIXY CHICK AT LOS ALAMITOS
It was a night of big prices in the two stakes races for sophomore fillies on Saturday night at Los Alamitos. Ninety minutes before Sweet Tess won the $438,500 Los Alamitos Oaks, Ed Allred’s Up To Good scored an upset win of her own in the $20,000 Sixy Chick Handicap at 350 yards.
The longest shot on the board at 10-1 odds, Up To Good defeated talented fillies, including the stakes winning Hitters Count, in the Sixy Chick. Ridden by Jonathan Roman for trainer Scott Willoughby, Up To Good led every step of the way, crossing the wire a half-length ahead of Hitters Count. Covering the distance in :18.13, Up To Good earned $11,000 for the win. Now a winner in three out of her 12 starts, the Kiddy Up filly out of Better Be Good has banked $33,160 in her career.
“We’ve always liked Up To Good, she’s just had a few tough races coming into this stakes,” Willoughby said. “Better Be Good has had good runners out of her.”
Up To Good’s full brothers have included Seems Even Better, who qualified to the 2017 Robert Adair Kindergarten Futurity and Best Yet, who ran third in the 2019 California Breeders Freshman Stakes. Up To Good’s most recent win came against allowance rivals in her first start of the year on January 22.
Hitters Count, who was making her first start since running in a trial to the PCQHRA Breeders Futurity on September 12, earned $4,500 for running second. The winner of the Fred Scane Memorial Stakes last June, Hitters Count took her career earnings to $32,160. The daughter of Kiddy Up out of What A Hit gave her sire a sweep of the top two spots in the Sixy Chick. Famous Carmilita, World Famous Mia and Race Thru The Fire completed the field.
The Sixy Chick is named in honor of the 1982 filly, who went on to win 11 of 15 starts for earnings of $751,284. The multiple stakes winner won four stakes races including the 1984 Faberge Special Effort Futurity for R.D. Hubbard and the 1985 Dash For Cash Derby for David Plummer, both stakes at Los Alamitos. The Faberge Special Effort Futurity was one of the richest races in Quarter Horse racing in the 1980s with a purse of over $1,000,000. Bred by L.D. Neumayer and Don Brooks, Sixy Chick was named the 1984 AQHA champion 2-year-old and a broodmare she produced six winners including stakes placed runners Le Ritz and Sixy Silk.
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