Life of Joy earned her first stakes victory Oct. 26 at Churchill Downs with a 2 ¼-length win in the $200,000 Rags to Riches S.
The 2-year-old Gun Runner filly is the 18th stakes winner of 2025 for her sire and also earned 10 points in the Road to the Kentucky Oaks series.
Sent away as the heavy favorite off her 14 ¾-length debut victory on Oct. 2, Life of Joy made her way into third while three-wide around the first turn. She travelled about two lengths behind the leader The Grumpy Rabbit down the backstretch, then steadily gained ground around the turn to vie for the lead at the top of the stretch. The Grumpy Rabbit resisted the challenge for a furlong, when Life of Joy began to pull away and win with authority in 1:45.76 for the 1 1/16-miles on a fast track.
“She showed a tremendous amount of talent there at Indiana and was an easy winner first out,” trainer Brad Cox said of the winner. “We shipped her back here immediately and just wanted to take our time with her. The work last week (four furlongs in :50.20) was a good move. She was moving well and I thought it showed us we can enter to see what the field was like. She backed up the way she was training the past couple weeks.”
Life of Joy, owned by Will Stroud, Andrew Farm, Mountmellick Farm and For the People Racing Stable LLC, has earned $141,270. She was bred in Kentucky by Springhouse Farm and sold for $375,000 at the 2024 Keeneland September Yearling sale.
