Not only did trainer Chad Brown win the Grade I Diana Stakes at Saratoga Race Course for the ninth time in his career — and eighth in the last nine years — but the horse who walked into the winner’s circle on Saturday was the same one who did so last year. Brown had five entered in the 10-horse field, but it was 2023 winner Whitebeam who got to the wire first, again, by three-quarters of a length over Moira. Whitebeam and jockey Flavien Prat were able to get to the lead and get through the early splits at a moderate pace, made a move at the quarter-pole and had enough left to hold off the hard charge from rivals.
Brown also trained Sistercharlie (2018-19) to back-to-back wins in the Diana, which was first run in 1939. Other horses who have won it twice in a row are Glowing Honor (1988-89), Shuvee (1970-71), Tempted (1959-60) and Miss Grillo (1946-47). Searching win it twice in three years, 1956 and 1958.
“There's a very short list of races when I left Frankel that it was just instilled in me that he held in high regard and pointed towards,” Brown said of the late Bobby Frankel, Brown’s former boss. “The Diana was way up on that list. For him to hold it in high regard, it really must have meant something.
“So, I thought if I ever had good enough horses, this is a race I really need to focus on because he’s not wrong much. I'm very fortunate to have horses good enough to run in this race, really." Prat was able to get the 5-year-old Whitebeam through the first.