Anita

Opening day at Santa Anita might have been delayed by two days because of heavy rain, but it was worth the wait for no other reason than to watch the stretch run of the $200,000 Laffit Pincay Jr. Stakes.

And for trainer Bob Baffert, it was even better than that. Not only did Nysos and Nevada Beach run 1-2 for him Sunday in the thrilling Grade 2 Pincay, but he also captured the two Grade 1 races he entered, the La Brea with Usha and the Malibu with Goal Oriented.

It was the fourth time Baffert won three stakes on the same day at Santa Anita, including the same trio of races on opening day in 2022.

He was especially excited after the Pincay, and not just by what he saw on the track.

“You know what’s great?” Baffert said as he stood in the winner’s circle and motioned to the grandstand, which was crowded with an announced 41,962 fans, the largest opening day audience since 2016. “It’s great to see this place packed. Look, everybody came out. They’ll come out to see a good horse and everybody was on the apron for this one. And they saw a great horse race.

“It was actually fun watching.”

Particularly for Baffert, who knew as the field turned into the stretch he couldn’t lose. Nysos, the Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile champion ridden by Flavien Prat, was on the inside of Nevada Beach, the Goodwood Stakes winner ridden by Juan Hernandez.

Nysos was the heavy 1-5 favorite, having lost only one of his seven lifetime races, but for at least a moment it looked as if he might not get past Nevada Beach, at 3 a year younger than his stablemate.

But, in a virtual rerun of the Dirt Mile, when Prat and Nysos edged past Hernandez and another Baffert 3-year-old, Citizen Bull, the older horse once again prevailed, again by a head.

“I was close,” Hernandez said. “My horse ran really good. I was in front on the stretch for a couple of jumps and then it was just back and forth between Nysos and my horse. … He was giving me everything he had.”

The Grade 2 Pincay (formerly the San Antonio) was one of six stakes races on opening day, which is traditionally held the day after Christmas. It wasn’t one of the three Grade 1 races, but the presence of Nysos made it feel like the day’s main event.

Nysos returned $2.40 after running 1 1/16 miles in 1:42.36, the fastest since the Pincay was moved to that distance in 2017.

Baffert said in the leadup to the race that Nysos likely would start next in the $20-million Saudi Cup on Feb. 14 in Riyadh, while Nevada Beach was more apt to go to the $3-million Pegasus World Cup next month at Gulfstream Park. After the Pincay, he didn’t rule out sending both to Saudi Arabia.

The only downside to Baffert’s stakes day was having to scratch Barnes and Cornucopian, the two morning-line favorites, from the Malibu. Barnes suffered a “minor setback” Saturday while Cornucopian had an incident in the paddock minutes before the race, which forced his withdrawal (he was uninjured).

No matter, though; Goal Oriented ($4.20) took over favoritism and earned his first stakes win, defeating stablemate Midland Money by a length in 1:20.97, the fastest Malibu since 2016.

“I’m just happy it turned out that we won it because it was so upsetting for a little bit,” Baffert said.

Usha ($13.20) was starting in a Grade 1 race for the first time, but she won the La Brea like a filly who has more victories in her future. She finished seven furlongs in a rapid 1:21.68 to beat 2-1 favorite Formula Rossa by 5¼ lengths.

The first of the six stakes races was the $200,000 Mathis Mile for 3-year-olds on the turf. Tempus Volat, trained by Leonard Powell, led the race but was passed in the final yard by Hiding in Honduras ($21.40), a 9-1 long shot ridden by Antonio Fresu for Jonathan Thomas. Namaron, the 1-2 favorite ridden by Prat, finished third.

There was no such drama in the second turf stakes, the $100,000 San Gabriel, in which Cabo Spirit ($14.80), trained by George Papaprodromou, took the lead shortly after the start under Mike Smith and rolled to a 1¼-length victory over Astronomer. Stay Hot, the 2-1 favorite, lost a photo for third to Mondego.

The final race of the day was the other Grade 1 event, the $300,000 American Oaks, won by another Thomas trainee, Ambaya, a 12-1 long shot. The daughter of Ghostzapper was ridden by Kazushi Kimura, who picked up the mount when Fresu injured his ankle earlier in the day.

Etc.

The two cards that were rained out over the weekend will be made up Monday and Wednesday, with free parking and admission. Both days will offer two stakes races; Monday’s highlight is the $200,000 Joe Hernandez, which includes Motorious and Sumter, who were 1-2 in the race last year, and Imagination, last month’s Breeders’ Cup Sprint runner-up who will be racing on turf for the first time.

Rain is forecast beginning Wednesday, with track officials saying they will monitor the situation before deciding on how it will affect the racing, if at all. The schedule calls for racing Thursday through Sunday before Santa Anita begins its normal schedule of Fridays through Sundays on Jan. 9.

Is there a dumpster somewhere to torch and bury this year of bedlam, 2025?

We near its end with equal amounts relief and trepidation. Surely we can’t be expected to endure another such tumultuous turn around the sun?

It was only January that Donald Trump moved back into the White House, apparently toting trunkloads of gilt for the walls. Within weeks, he’d declared an emergency at the border; set in motion plans to dismantle government agencies; fired masses of federal workers; and tariffs, tariffs, tariffs.

Demonstrators at a No Kings rally in Washington, protesting actions by President Trump and Elon Musk.

(Jose Luis Magana / Associated Press)

By spring, the administration was attacking Harvard as a test case for strong-arming higher education. By June, Trump’s grotesquely misnamed Big Beautiful Bill had become law, giving $1 trillion in tax cuts to billionaires and funding a deportation effort (and armed force) that has fundamentally reshaped American immigration law and ended any pretense about targeting “the worst of the worst.”

Fall and winter have brought questionable bombings of boats in the Caribbean, a further backing away from Ukraine, a crackdown on opposition to Trump by classifying it as leftist terrorism and congressional inaction on healthcare that will leave many struggling to stay insured.

That’s the short list.

It was a year when America tried something new, and while adherents of the MAGA movement may celebrate much of it, our columnists Anita Chabria and Mark Z. Barabak have a different perspective.

Here, they renew their annual tradition of looking at the year past and offering some thoughts on what the new year may bring.

Chabria: Welp, that was something. I can’t say 2025 was a stellar year for the American experiment, but it certainly will make the history books.

Before we dive into pure politics, I’ll start with something positive. I met a married couple at a No Kings rally in Sacramento who were dressed up as dinosaurs, inspired by the Portland Frog, an activist who wears an inflatable amphibian suit.

When I asked why, the husband told me, “If you don’t do something soon, you will have democracy be extinct.”

Crowds participate in No Kings Day in downtown Los Angeles in October.

(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)

I loved that so many Americans were doing something by turning out to not just protest policies that hit personally, but to rally in support of democracy writ large. For many, it was their first time taking this kind of action, and they were doing it in a way that expressed optimism and possibility rather than giving in to anger or despair. Where there is humor, there is hope.

Barabak: As in, it only hurts when I laugh?

In 2024, a plurality of Americans voted to reinstall Trump in the White House — warts, felony conviction and all — mainly in the hope he would bring down the cost of living and make eggs and gasoline affordable again.

While eggs and gas are no longer exorbitant, the cost of just about everything else continues to climb. Or, in the case of beef, utility bills and insurance, skyrocket.

The John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts is another of the long-standing institutions Trump has smeared his name across.

(Jacquelyn Martin / Associated Press)

Meantime, the president seems less concerned with improving voters’ lives than smearing his name on every object he lays his eyes on, one of the latest examples being the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

(The only place Trump doesn’t want to see his name is in those voluminous Epstein files.)

I wonder: Why stop there? Why not brand these the United States of Trump-erica, then boast we live in the “hottest” country on Planet Trump?

Chabria: Stop giving him ideas!

You and I agree that it’s been a difficult year full of absurdity, but we’ve disagreed on how seriously to take Trump as a threat to democracy. As the year closes, I am more concerned than ever.

It’s not the ugly antics of ego that alarm me, but the devastating policies that will be hard to undo — if we get the chance to undo them.

The race-based witch hunt of deportations is obviously at the top of that list, but the demolition of both K-12 and higher education; the dismantling of federal agencies, thereby cutting our scientific power as a nation; the increasing oligarchy of tech industrialists; the quiet placement of election deniers in key election posts — these are all hammers bashing away at our democracy.

Now, we are seeing overt antisemitism and racism on the MAGA right, with alarming acceptance from many. The far right has championed a debate as dumb as it is frightening, about “heritage” Americans being somehow a higher class of citizens than nonwhites.

Vice President JD Vance speaks at the University of Mississippi in Oxford.

(Gerald Herbert / Associated Press)

Recently, Vice President JD Vance gave a speech in which he announced, “In the United States of America, you don’t have to apologize for being white anymore,” and Trump has said he wants to start taking away citizenship from legal immigrants. Both men claim America is a Christian nation, and eschew diversity as a value.

Do you still think American democracy is secure, and this political moment will pass without lasting damage to our democratic norms?

Barabak: I’ll start with some differentiation.

I agree that Trump is sowing seeds or, more specifically, enacting policies and programs, that will germinate and do damage for many years to come.

Alienating our allies, terrorizing communities with his prejudicial anti-immigrant policies — which go far beyond a reasonable tightening of border security — starving science and other research programs. The list is a long and depressing one, as you suggest.

But I do believe — cue the trumpets and cherubs — there is nothing beyond the power of voters to fix.

To quote, well, me, there is no organism on the planet more sensitive to heat and light than a politician. We’ve already seen an anti-Trump backlash in a series of elections held this year, in red and blue state alike. A strong repudiation in the 2026 midterm election will do more than all the editorial tut-tutting and protest marches combined. (Not that either are bad things.)

A stressed-out seeming poll worker in a polling station at Los Angeles’ Union Station.

(Eric Thayer / Los Angeles Times)

The best way to preserve our democracy and uphold America’s values is for unhappy citizens to register their dissent via the ballot box. And to address at least one of your concerns, I’m not too worried about Trump somehow nullifying the results, given legal checks and the decentralization of our election system.

Installing lawmakers in Congress with a mandate to hold Trump to account would be a good start toward repairing at least some of the damage he’s wrought. And if it turns into a Republican rout, it’ll be quite something to watch the president’s onetime allies run for the hills as fast as their weak knees allow.

Chabria: OMG! It’s a holiday miracle. We agree!

I think the midterms will be messy, but I don’t think this will be an election where Trump, or anyone, outright tries to undo overall results.

Although I do think the groundwork will be laid to sow further doubt in our election integrity ahead of 2028, and we will see bogus claims of fraud and lawsuits.

So the midterms very well could be a reset if Democrats take control of something, anything. We would likely not see past damage repaired, but may see enough opposition to slow the pace of whatever is happening now, and offer transparency and oversight.

But the 2026 election only matters if people vote, which historically is not something a great number of people do in midterms. At this point, there are few people out there who haven’t heard about the stakes in November, but that still doesn’t translate to folks — lazy, busy, distracted — weighing in.

If proposed restrictions on mail-in ballots or voter identification take effect, even just in some states, that will also change the outcomes.

But there is hope, always hope.

Barabak: On that note, let’s recognize a few of the many good things that happened in 2025.

MacKenzie Scott donated $700 million to more than a dozen historically Black colleges and universities, showing that not all tech billionaires are selfish and venal.

The Dodgers won their second championship and, while this San Francisco Giants fan was not pleased, their seven-game thriller against the Toronto Blue Jays was a World Series for the ages.

And the strength and resilience shown by survivors of January’s SoCal firestorm has been something to behold.

Any others, beside your demonstrating dinos, who deserve commendation?

Pope Leo XIV waves after delivering the Christmas Day blessing from the main balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican.

(Gregorio Borgia / Associated Press)

Chabria: Though I’m not Catholic, I have been surprisingly inspired by Pope Leo XIV.

So I’ll leave us with a bit of his advice for the future: “Be agents of communion, capable of breaking down the logic of division and polarization, of individualism and egocentrism.”

Many of us are tired, and suffering from Trump fatigue. Regardless, to put it in nonpapal terms, it may be a dumpster — but we’re all in it together.

Barabak: I’d like to end, as we do each year, with a thank you to our readers.

Anita and I wouldn’t be here — which would greatly please some folks — but for you. (And a special nod to the paid subscribers out there. You help keep the lights on.)

Here’s wishing each and all a happy, healthy and prosperous new year.

We’ll see you again in 2026.

People place bets at Santa Anita Park, where purses have declined along with the number of horses racing and lack of money coming from off-site betting.

(Getty Images)

Figuring out the purse for 34 of the 35 graded stakes races at Santa Anita is, for horsemen anyway, maddeningly simple: Just look up the minimum purse required in North America.

For a Grade 1 race, that’s $300,000. It drops to $200,000 for Grade 2 races and $100,000 for Grade 3s.

Even the one local exception, the Santa Anita Derby, pays “only” $500,000 after offering $750,000 from 2021-24. The current amount is half the purse on offer for the top 3-year-old races at Gulfstream Park (Florida Derby) and Fair Grounds (Louisiana Derby), and just one-third what Oaklawn Park pays for the Arkansas Derby.

Last year the Santa Anita Derby attracted only five entries, which reduced the number of Kentucky Derby qualifying points available in the race. That almost kept Baeza, who finished second to Journalism in the Arcadia race, from qualifying for the Derby (he made it in the field only after another horse was scratched and wound up placing third).

It’s the same story for older horses, where Gulfstream offers the $3-million Pegasus World Cup next month plus turf races for $1 million and $500,000. Oaklawn Park has a half-dozen races worth at least $500,000 (two at $1.25 million), and Fair Grounds has three between $250,000 and $500,000. No Grade 3 race at any of those tracks offers less than $150,000.

All of that makes it harder for Santa Anita to attract top horses from those states, which increase purses with money from slot machines or casinos, something not available to California tracks. Santa Anita, however, has hiked its purses this meeting for maiden and allowance races.

After days of deliberation and faced with a forecast getting soggier by the day, Santa Anita officials have decided to postpone opening day of the 2025-26 race meeting from Friday until Sunday, Dec. 28.

It’s just the second time since 1976 that Santa Anita will not open on the day after Christmas. The other time was in 2019 for the same reason: wet weather. More than eight inches of rain are projected to fall between Tuesday night and Friday at Santa Anita.

“With the amount of rain being forecast, it’s important to make this call as early as possible to give everyone advance notice,” Santa Anita general manager Nate Newby said in a statement. “Everyone looks forward to opening day as it’s traditionally one of our biggest days of the year, so it’s not a decision we make lightly. But after speaking with our stakeholders, adjusting the racing schedule at this time provides the best opportunity to have a great opening to kick off the season.”

There is no state rule against running in the mud or on a softer turf course, but protocols put in place after the 2018-19 winter-spring meeting, when 30 horses died during racing or training at Santa Anita, often result in the track postponing or canceling race days.

Opening day usually draws the largest crowd of the year at Santa Anita. Last year’s announced on-track attendance was 41,562, the highest total on a non-weekend or holiday on opening day since 1990. Total mutuel handle was more than $21.4 million, the third-highest ever on the first day.

The 11 races scheduled for Friday now will be run two days later, with first post at 11 a.m. There are six stakes races set for opening day, three on turf, with Santa Anita officials hoping that waiting until Sunday will allow the grass course to dry enough to allow racing.

Tickets purchased for opening day will be honored Dec. 28, with full refunds available on request. The revised schedule for the opening two weeks will feature racing Dec. 28 and 29, then every day from Wednesday, Dec. 31, through Sunday, Jan. 4.