The undefeated Good Cheer will look to add the biggest prize in the country for 3-year-old fillies when she leaves the starting gate in the 2025 Kentucky Oaks on Friday at Churchill Downs in Louisville, KY.
A powerful late runner, Good Cheer has won her six starts by more than 42 lengths combined. She is coming off arguably the best performance of her career, a 3½-length victory in the Fair Grounds Oaks. For Friday, she has been installed as the formidable 6-5 morning-line favorite.
“She’s very steady, easy to be around and always listens to her rider,” said her trainer Brad Cox, a Louisville native. “She’s 6-for-6. She’s perfect to this point, and hopefully we can continue that.”
Good Cheer’s primary competition in the 13-horse field is likely to come from either Ashland Stakes winner La Cara (6-1) or Fantasy Stakes winner Quietside (8-1). Trained by Mark Casse, La Cara prefers doing her running on the front end; three of her four career victories have come while setting the pace. The one time she won without the early lead was at Churchill Downs in the Pocahontas Stakes in September.
La Cara has impressed trackside observers in the morning with her workouts at Churchill Downs where she has spent most of her life. On Friday, she is projected to sit just outside another speedster, Simply Joking. Get full Kentucky Oaks analysis and expert picks at SportsLine.
“She’s on top of her game,” Casse said of La Cara. “She’s gonna be a horse to be reckoned with.”
Meanwhile, Quietside enters the Oaks on a two-race winning streak, each win hard-fought. However, she drew the far outside No. 14 post position (she will leave the starting gate from post No. 13 after the scratch of Five G). With that post and her running style, Quietside risks losing significant ground to her rivals.
“She’s doing so good,” Quietside’s trainer John Ortiz told FanDuel TV this week. “I think it’s scary good how great she looks.”
Post time for the $1.5 million race is 5:51 p.m. ET.
