Splendora may be lightly raced, but she has a way of making her presence felt when she does step onto the racetrack. A sharp winner of the 2025 PNC Bank Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint (USA-G1) at Del Mar after a tuneup win in the Tranquility Lake Stakes over the same track, the now 5-year-old mare came back after a three-month freshener to win the D. Wayne Lukas Stakes (USA-G2) at Santa Anita on February 7. She returned to the Grade 1 level in the B. Wayne Hughes Beholder Mile Stakes presented by FanDuel a month later and looked every inch the part of a 1-10 favorite, simply cruising over four outmatched opponents to score by 5¾ lengths. Her lifetime record stands at seven wins and four seconds from 12 starts with US$1,160,800 in the bank, a nice return on the US$125,000 she cost as a yearling at the 2022 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky July yearling sale.
Bred in Maryland by the Elkstone Group, Splendora is the first top-level winner sired by the Into Mischief son Audible. The winner of the 2018 Xpressbet.com Florida Derby (USA-G1), Audible is out of the sprint winner Blue Devil Bel, whose sire Gilded Time was the American champion 2-year-old male of 1992. Audible's female line traces back to Romanita, the 1956 American champion 2-year-old filly.
Splendora is the second foal of Miss Freeze, whose first foal is the winning Always Dreaming mare Firsttimeinforever. Sold for US$45,000 at the 2020 Keeneland November mixed sale while carrying the Breeders’ Cup winner, she has since produced the unraced Demarchelier 3-year-old Oracle of Beaufort and a 2025 Tiz the Law filly before being covered by National Treasure for 2026.
The winner of the restricted Lynbrook Stakes over 6 furlongs at Belmont as a juvenile of 2014, Miss Freeze is a daughter of the Giant’s Causeway horse Frost Giant, who got his signature win in the 2008 Suburban Handicap (USA-G1). She was produced from the winner Reata’s Vixen, whose Irish-bred sire, Sligo Bay (by Sadler’s Wells), won the 2002 Hollywood Turf Cup Stakes (USA-G1) and was a prominent sire in Canada. Sligo Bay was produced from Angelic Song, a full sister to 1980 Canadian Horse of the Year Glorious Song, 1983 American champion 2-year-old male Devil’s Bag, and Grade 2 winner and 2005 American champion sire Saint Ballado.
A half sister to multiple listed stakes winner Royal Currier (by Red Bullet), who spent his racing career sprinting up and down the East Coast, Reata’s Vixen did her best running at at a mile or a mile and one-sixteenth on the turf but apparently passed on more of the speed of her broodmare sire, two-time Carter Handicap (USA-G1) winner Lite the Fuse. The female line traces back to 1966 Kentucky Oaks winner Native Street, a speedy filly who owed her Oaks win over a mile and one-sixteenth to sheer determination (she never won a stakes race before or afterward at more than 6 furlongs) and passed on that speed and gameness to her descendants.
Splendora’s pedigree shows a mix of speed and stamina elements, but given that her sire, her broodmare sire, and her second dam’s sire all did their best running around two turns, her preference for shorter distances seems a little surprising even given the speedy nature of her direct female line. Nevertheless, she was beaten five lengths by Seismic Beauty in her one try at 9 furlongs (the 2025 Santa Margarita Stakes, USA-G2), and the horse in front of you is always more important than the pedigree on paper. Pedigrees show genetic potentials; the horse itself is the reality, and it’s a wise owner and trainer who let the horse rather than a piece of paper dictate what it wants to do.
Future plans for Splendora are still unsettled, but trainer Bob Baffert and co-owner Michael Talla (whose By Talla Racing shares ownership in the mare with Boyd Racing) have indicated that the long-term goal will probably be a defense of her title in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint with an Eclipse Award in mind. Should she remain sound and healthy, her results up to now suggest that she has a good chance of doing just that,
Bred in Maryland by the Elkstone Group, Splendora is the first top-level winner sired by the Into Mischief son Audible. The winner of the 2018 Xpressbet.com Florida Derby (USA-G1), Audible is out of the sprint winner Blue Devil Bel, whose sire Gilded Time was the American champion 2-year-old male of 1992. Audible's female line traces back to Romanita, the 1956 American champion 2-year-old filly.
Splendora is the second foal of Miss Freeze, whose first foal is the winning Always Dreaming mare Firsttimeinforever. Sold for US$45,000 at the 2020 Keeneland November mixed sale while carrying the Breeders’ Cup winner, she has since produced the unraced Demarchelier 3-year-old Oracle of Beaufort and a 2025 Tiz the Law filly before being covered by National Treasure for 2026.
The winner of the restricted Lynbrook Stakes over 6 furlongs at Belmont as a juvenile of 2014, Miss Freeze is a daughter of the Giant’s Causeway horse Frost Giant, who got his signature win in the 2008 Suburban Handicap (USA-G1). She was produced from the winner Reata’s Vixen, whose Irish-bred sire, Sligo Bay (by Sadler’s Wells), won the 2002 Hollywood Turf Cup Stakes (USA-G1) and was a prominent sire in Canada. Sligo Bay was produced from Angelic Song, a full sister to 1980 Canadian Horse of the Year Glorious Song, 1983 American champion 2-year-old male Devil’s Bag, and Grade 2 winner and 2005 American champion sire Saint Ballado.
A half sister to multiple listed stakes winner Royal Currier (by Red Bullet), who spent his racing career sprinting up and down the East Coast, Reata’s Vixen did her best running at at a mile or a mile and one-sixteenth on the turf but apparently passed on more of the speed of her broodmare sire, two-time Carter Handicap (USA-G1) winner Lite the Fuse. The female line traces back to 1966 Kentucky Oaks winner Native Street, a speedy filly who owed her Oaks win over a mile and one-sixteenth to sheer determination (she never won a stakes race before or afterward at more than 6 furlongs) and passed on that speed and gameness to her descendants.
Splendora’s pedigree shows a mix of speed and stamina elements, but given that her sire, her broodmare sire, and her second dam’s sire all did their best running around two turns, her preference for shorter distances seems a little surprising even given the speedy nature of her direct female line. Nevertheless, she was beaten five lengths by Seismic Beauty in her one try at 9 furlongs (the 2025 Santa Margarita Stakes, USA-G2), and the horse in front of you is always more important than the pedigree on paper. Pedigrees show genetic potentials; the horse itself is the reality, and it’s a wise owner and trainer who let the horse rather than a piece of paper dictate what it wants to do.
Future plans for Splendora are still unsettled, but trainer Bob Baffert and co-owner Michael Talla (whose By Talla Racing shares ownership in the mare with Boyd Racing) have indicated that the long-term goal will probably be a defense of her title in the Breeders’ Cup Filly and Mare Sprint with an Eclipse Award in mind. Should she remain sound and healthy, her results up to now suggest that she has a good chance of doing just that,
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