She went off as one of the longest shots in the field and with something of a chip on her shoulder.\u00a0 Zeco1<\/EM><\/STRONG> stable’s Wondergirl Elf<\/STRONG> was out to prove that her blockbuster effort in the Grade II Fantasia Handicap<\/EM> last out was a sign of things to come.\u00a0 But with her win in last Saturday’s Iool Oaks<\/EM>, ‘Elf made the sophomore filly division take notice: this one’s the real deal.<\/P> Her connections were seen earlier in the week performing a rain dance on the infield.\u00a0 Their filly had a win and a place from two starts in the mud coming into the Iool, and when the track came up sloppy on race day, it was drinks and pats on the back all around.<\/P> The bright chestnut daughter of Danzig Connection didn’t have too much mud kicked in her blazed face.\u00a0 She broke alertly from the far outside and cut in, settling in a comfortable stalking position behind the free-running Wango Tango<\/STRONG>.\u00a0 Only Jades Treasure<\/STRONG> tried to run with the leader, and that one began to struggle early on.\u00a0 So R. Johnston asked Wondergirl Elf for some run and she almost left him behind, zipping up to catch the leader and then kicking clear to win by a length.<\/P> Wondergirl Elf is a homebred daughter of Danzig Connection and out of a winning Storm Cat mare.\u00a0 The Iool marks her third win and eighth top-three finish in ten career starts and pushes her earnings to nearly $450,000.\u00a0 Her class rank is fourteen in the classic division, placing her solidly in the Bluegrass Oaks<\/EM> hunt should her connections so desire.\u00a0 She covered the mile and one-sixteenth in 1:42 and 3\/5, recording a snappy 100 speed rating, a career best to date.<\/P> Experience over an off-track may have been as telling as speed on Saturday.\u00a0 Armed<\/STRONG> With Money<\/STRONG> ran a good third over a “good” surface last time out and improved her luck by one place in the Iool.\u00a0 The Military daughter dwelt in twelfth for much of the race, just ahead of third-place finisher Espresso D’Italia<\/STRONG>.\u00a0 They got rolling in lockstep, but ‘Money came home a bit more brilliantly, finishing two and a quarter lengths clear of the steady-running ‘Espresso.\u00a0 Both fillies looked to be itching for more distance and punched their tickets for the Oaks.<\/P> Unbridled Mistress<\/STRONG> settled midpack and made a mild rally for fourth.\u00a0 Wango Tango set the early pace but couldn’t match strides with the others late and had to settle for the last small check.<\/P> Genna Lou Hoo<\/STRONG> and Quality Material<\/STRONG> picked up the pieces from the rear of the pack, while Five Points<\/STRONG> may have been a bit jetlagged and failed to quicken up, finishing between those two.\u00a0 Punch Drunk T<\/STRONG> tired herself out chasing the early pace.\u00a0 Favored Fame Or Fortune<\/STRONG> was uncharacteristically flat.\u00a0 Jades Treasure<\/STRONG>, as above, tried to keep tabs on the leader but found the mud tough going, as Amazing Discovery(Ire)<\/STRONG> and Troubleinparadise(Ire)<\/STRONG> called it quits and went out for a Guinness instead.<\/P><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" $500,000 Grade I Iool Oaks (PA)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2183","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/93"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2183"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2183\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/btb.ehorseracing.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}