VSiN Senior Editor Adam Burke previews the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile 2025, including the entries, odds, and past performances of the field.
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Eight of the nation’s top 2-year-old horses are on hand at Del Mar for the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile 2025 edition. Interestingly, these are all Kentucky-bred colts and geldings going for the biggest piece of the $2 million prize pool.
Also, this race is part of the 2026 Road to the Kentucky Derby and a 30-15-9-6-3 point scale, which is triple a normal early prep race for the first leg of the Triple Crown. A total of 30 points is hardly a guarantee for entry into the field, as the cut-off last year was 37.5 points with Baeza, who was an Also Eligible and then ran third to Journalism and Sovereignty.
Last year’s Breeders’ Cup Juvenile winner was Citizen Bull, who we’ll see on Saturday during Breeders’ Cup weekend in the Dirt Mile. Fierceness won this race two years ago and then finished 15th in the Kentucky Derby, but he’s had a strong career otherwise and is a legitimate contender for the Breeders’ Cup Classic on Saturday.
The Breeders’ Cup Juvenile will be Race 9 in your Friday Del Mar program with post time expected to be 7:45 p.m. ET on October 31.
Breeders’ Cup Juvenile 2025 Entries, Horses, Jockeys, and Trainers:
| Post | Horse | Jockey | Trainer | Odds |
| 1 | Intrepido | H. Berrios | J. Mullins | 8-1 |
| 2 | Blackout Time | I. Ortiz Jr. | K. McPeek | 5-1 |
| 3 | Mr. A. P. | A. Fresu | V. Cerin | 30-1 |
| 4 | Comport | T. Gaffalione | E. Kenneally | 30-1 |
| 5 | Civil Liberty | L. Dettori | D. O’Neill | 30-1 |
| 6 | Litmus Test | J. Ortiz | B. Baffert | 15-1 |
| 7 | Brant | F. Prat | B. Baffert | 5/2 |
| 8 | Ted Noffey | J. Velaquez | T. Pletcher | 4/5 |
Bob Baffert goes for his seventh career win in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile. He has never had the back-to-back winner, so this could be some history for the Baffert barn if second favorite Brant or long shot Litmus Test are able to cross the line first.
Todd Pletcher had the winner in 2022 (Forte) and 2023 (Fierceness) for Mike Repole Stables and he’ll look to do the same here for Spendthrift Farm with favorite Ted Noffey.
The Breeders’ Cup Juvenile has the “Juvenile Jinx” label on it because Nyquist and Street Sense are the only winners of this race to go on to win the Kentucky Derby.
Here are some thoughts on each horse at the odds at time of publish:
1. Intrepido (8-1; Berrios/Mullins): Intrepido, the son of Maximus Mischief and Overly Indulgent, and, of course, paternal grandson of Into Mischief, has the rail post here after winning the American Pharoah Stakes at Santa Anita earlier this month. Hector Berrios rode him to his maiden win on this very Del Mar track over a mile and then pushed him out to 1 1/16.
Trainer Jeff Mullins only entered the week with 220 starts, but a 23% Win% and a 55% WPS%, so he’s picked his spots wisely this year. In eight graded stakes, he’s picked up three wins, including Intrepido’s earlier this month. It wasn’t the easiest or cleanest ride for Berrios in the American Pharoah, as he got caught in traffic twice, but his horse finished stronger than the field at nearly 9-1 odds with a six-horse start.
2. Blackout Time (5-1; I. Ortiz/McPeek): It looks like a lot of horses will lose to Ted Noffey in their careers. Blackout Time did in the Breeders’ Futurity last time out for Carlos Torres in place of the injured Brian Hernandez. Kenny McPeek gets a significant rider upgrade here with Irad Ortiz. It was a strong effort from Blackout Time, who finished nearly three lengths back, but improved his Beyer for the third straight race and a repeat of 93 should be good enough to hit the board here.
This is the first big shipping endeavor for the son of Not This Time and Beauty Parlor, as he’s run twice in Kentucky and once at Ellis Park where he broke his maiden by nearly 10 lengths. Speaking of 10, that was the jump in his Beyer race over race, charting an 83 in that maiden win and then the aforementioned 93 in his stakes debut. You just wonder about his closing ability in a race with two potential monsters towards the outside.
3. Mr. A. P. (30-1; Fresu/Cerin): Antonio Fresu and Vladimir Cerin send this son of American Pharoah into the dirt ring against some heavyweights. It does seem encouraging that his best career Beyer came two races ago at Del Mar before breaking his maiden on October 13 at Santa Anita. But, it was a drop from 88 to 81 and that has to be a concern here going up against such a huge field. He went off as the easy favorite in that $61k MSW and only won by a nose over Cherokee Nation.
4. Comport (30-1; Gaffalione/Kenneally): Records can tell you a lot, but they can’t tell you everything. Comport has finished first or second in four career starts, including a win in the Ellis Park Juvenile and a second in the Iroquois Stakes in on the Road to the Kentucky Derby. However, his Beyers of 63, 77, 80, and 76 don’t line up with the top contenders in this race. It does make you wonder a bit about Spice Runner, who beat Comport by a head in the Iroquois and finished two lengths back in the EP Juvenile. It also makes you wonder how Comport can hang with this field.
5. Civil Liberty (30-1; Dettori/O’Neill): Breeders’ Cup weekend started with the huge announcement that Sovereignty would miss the Classic and then we got another big bit of news later that afternoon when Lanfranco “Frankie” Dettori announced that he would be retiring from North American racing after this weekend. The 54-year-old Italian will give South America a try for a little while after this stop at Del Mar.
We’ll see if he can take down a big prize, but it won’t be on Civil Liberty, as the 30-1 shot has finished second, third, and fourth. If Dettori can resurrect Civil Liberty’s 87 Beyer from his maiden, which was a 5 ¼-length loss to Brant, he has the chance to fill out exotics.
6. Litmus Test (15-1; J. Ortiz/Baffert): Can lightning strike again for Baffert and the Nyquist bloodline here? Nyquist won this race back in 2015 and has produced some damn good racehorses since retiring. Nysos is the favorite in Saturday’s Dirt Mile. Argos is a legitimate contender in the Juvenile Turf right after this race. Gosger was runner-up in the Preakness. Randomized is a five-time Stakes winner. Johannes was runner-up in the Breeders’ Cup Mile last year and will run it again on Saturday.
Litmus Test has gone up in performance in each race with three different riders and will get another one here in Jose Ortiz. He posted an 89 Beyer finishing behind Ted Noffey and Blackout Time over 1 1/16 at Keeneland in the Breeders’ Futurity, but now he’s back at Del Mar, where he had his first two starts. Recent workouts have been decent and he’s definitely a long shot to think about with short prices to his right that he can follow for the pace of this race.
7. Brant (5/2; Prat/Baffert): Is this a sell high spot on Brant? The son of Gun Runner and Tynan has been on the shelf for a bit. He won easily in his maiden special weight debut in July with a stellar 101 Beyer. While he won the Del Mar Futurity the next time out, he only posted a 91 Beyer. It was still good enough to beat Desert Gate and Civil Liberty, but he only won by a length as a massive favorite. This will be his first two-turn race. While distance shouldn’t be an issue for a Gun Runner colt, whose resume includes the 2017 Breeders’ Cup Classic triumph, we haven’t seen this distance yet.
He did run away from the field in his maiden, but never got distance on the challengers with the bump from 5 ½ furlongs to 7. As we know, a lot of horseplayers look with skepticism at the California runners, but most of Baffert’s six winners have primarily run there before winning this race. He hasn’t run in over two months, a much longer layoff than most of this field.
8. Ted Noffey (4/5; Velazquez/Pletcher): An odds-on price for a cross-country shipper is always interesting, but Ted Noffey, which is a spoonerism for Spendthrift Farm exec Ned Toffey, sure does look like the one to beat. In two sprints at Saratoga and a route race at Keeneland, he’s 3-for-3 and they’ve all been pretty comfortable wins. The son of Into Mischief and Streak of Luck has Johnny Velazquez in the mount again for Todd Pletcher. Johnny V has run all three times with Ted Noffey and has widened the gap the finish every time.
The consistency is probably the most impressive part, firing an 86 Beyer in his maiden before 98 and 97 scores after that. As mentioned, Brant saw a 10-point drop from his first race to his second. Intrepido, Litmus Test, and Blackout Time have all improved with each race, but Blackout Time is the only one of the three with a Beyer in the 90s and he lost by nearly three lengths to Ted Noffey in the Breeders’ Futurity with his career-best 93. Does he have another gear to close the gap and be Ted Noffey’s biggest threat?
Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Predictions
I think it is worth considering that Blackout Time’s sire, Not This Time, jumped 15 points in Equibase Speed Figure from his Iroquois Stakes win to his Breeders’ Cup Juvenile runner-up, which wound up being his last career race. Add in Irad Ortiz Jr. in the irons and that might make the difference. Had he followed in his father’s footsteps, Blackout Time would have won the Iroquois running away.
Ted Noffey’s baseline is certainly good enough to win here, but can he fire more if he needs to? Could we see a similar downturn like we saw with Brant race over race, especially with the long ship to the West Coast? I think so. I’ll take the shot with Blackout Time’s trend line over those two and will take the improving Litmus Test to fill the super. Another five-point Beyer bump for Blackout Time and he’s right on par with Ted Noffey.
Prediction: 2-8-7-6
