Horse Profile: Ten Happy Rose

Breeders' Cup Mile Scouting Report

(Editor's note: Originally published in the 2024 BRISnet Breeders' Cup International Report) 

After a 207-1 shock in the “Win and You’re In” Victoria Mile (G1), Ten Happy Rose would be easy to discount. But her up-and-coming trainer Daisuke Takayanagi is starting to make a habit of sending out overachievers on big days. His T O Saint Denis (Dirt Mile) was runner-up in the Alysheba (G2), and stablemate T O Password ran an incredible fifth in the Kentucky Derby (G1) in just his third lifetime start.

Ten Happy Rose, who technically earned a free pass to the Filly & Mare Turf, instead sticks to a more suitable distance in the Mile. Although her Group 1 laurel appeared to come from nowhere, she does have a solid pedigree. 

Her sire, 2014 Japan Cup (G1) star Epiphaneia, is himself a son of champion and prolific matron Cesario, whom U.S. fans might remember for crushing the old American Oaks (G1) at Hollywood Park in 2005. Epiphaneia has sired several classic winners, including former Japanese Horse of the Year Efforia and Fillies’ Triple Crown sweeper Daring Tact. 

Ten Happy Rose is out of a mare by Tanino Gimlet, best remembered as the sire of superstar Vodka. This is the family of Sundrop, the close runner-up in Newmarket’s 1000 Guineas (G1) in 2004, and further back, 1995 Breeders’ Cup Turf champion Northern Spur. 

Perhaps Ten Happy Rose has finally tapped into that genetic potential at the age of six. Yet she did give a glimpse of ability as a juvenile. A strong-closing winner of an about six-furlong newcomers’ race at Kokura, she stayed on for third to white wonder Sodashi in the 2020 Artemis (G3) over Tokyo’s metric mile. 

After failing to make an impact in a pair of 2021 classic trials – checking in fourth as the favorite in the Fairy (G3) and 10th in the Tulip Sho (G2) – Ten Happy Rose lowered her sights to allowance company. She also benefited from shortening up to about seven furlongs. Over the course of about a year, she won three times in those conditions (one apiece at Hanshin, Niigata, and Tokyo), and worked her way up to listed stakes by the second half of 2022.

Ten Happy Rose appeared better suited to listed than Group company, considering her two listed stakes placings before her breakthrough at that level in the 2023 Toki S. at Niigata. In contrast, she was unplaced when attempting the Kyoto Himba (G3) and Hanshin Himba (G2) for the past two years. 

Thus bettors completely ignored her on the class hike for the May 12 Victoria Mile. With the benefit of hindsight, Ten Happy Rose could claim a horse-for-the-course angle at Tokyo, where she’d won or placed in five of six starts. Indeed, all of her previous black-type had come over left-handed tracks. 

Also, compared to last year, Ten Happy Rose had posted better closing sectionals in the same right-handed preps, even though she didn’t materially improve her finishing position. She clocked :33.6 when sixth in her Feb. 17 Kyoto Himba comeback and :33.2 when seventh in the April 6 Hanshin Himba, implying that she might be stronger this spring. 

Still, it was difficult to project a radical new top in her 24th lifetime start, especially since she’d yet to win going as far as a metric mile. Ten Happy Rose picked the right day to do just that, enjoying a clear run on the outside to stun all the logical players.

But the Victoria Mile would almost certainly have yielded a different result if the favorite, Masked Diva, hadn’t had a nightmare trip. Literally shut off between foes in the stretch and forced to alter course to the inside, she ended up third in what the racecaller described as a “tragedy.”

Ten Happy Rose has run once since, in the Sept. 8 Centaur (G2) against sprint specialists. Cutting back to about six furlongs for the first time since her debut, she reported home seventh, beaten all of three lengths, in a tightener that should bring her on as designed. 

The obvious question is whether Ten Happy Rose has another huge upset in her. Even if she really is in the form of her life, the other concern is the configuration of Del Mar. She’s a deep closer who takes time to wind up down the long straights in Japan, and she’ll have a short homestretch to work with here.