For the Partners in Counting Stars, Saturday’s $600,000 Alabama Stakes (G1) at Saratoga represents the latest chapter in a ride that has already gone well beyond what anyone could reasonably have imagined. For a number of her partners, Counting Stars is their first racehorse. Now they head into one of the most prestigious races for 3-year-old fillies with a six-time winner, more than $1.66 million in earnings, two Grade 1 victories and a legitimate opportunity to put herself in the driver’s seat for an Eclipse Award as Champion 3-Year-Old Filly.

The Alabama will air live on Fox network channel. 

Counting Stars has made Saratoga her stage this summer. She captured the Acorn (G1) by 3 3/4 lengths in June, then returned in July and was even better in the Coaching Club American Oaks (G1). Showing a new dimension that afternoon, she went to the front and never looked back, drawing away by 4 1/4 lengths and earning a career-best 100 Beyer Speed Figure. Trainer Mark Casse believes there may still be more to come.

“She’s just gotten bigger and stronger with racing,” Casse said. “A lot of horses plateau early and don’t improve, and she’s just gotten better and better.” He added, “She amazes me each and every day.”

Saturday brings a new challenge in the mile-and-a-quarter Alabama, but also an opportunity to accomplish something extraordinarily rare. A victory would give Counting Stars three Grade 1 victories at Saratoga in the same year. Daily Racing Form noted that Ginger Punch and November Snow each won three Grade 1 races at Saratoga, but did so over two different seasons. Counting Stars has the chance to do it in a single Saratoga summer, having already swept the Acorn and CCA Oaks. A third Grade 1 victory would also go a long way toward securing championship honors at the end of the year.

She will face five rivals Saturday, including Casse stablemate Measure and the rapidly improving My Gun’s Loaded.  The Alabama goes as Race 11 with a scheduled post time of 6:42 p.m. ET.

Whatever happens Saturday, Counting Stars has already given her Partners the kind of experience people get into horse racing hoping to find and very rarely do. But there is still a lot in front of her. From a $150,000 2-year-old purchase to a Kentucky Oaks placing, two Grade 1 victories at Saratoga and now the doorstep of a championship, she has continued to raise the bar at every turn. On Saturday, she gets the opportunity to raise it once more and perhaps leave Saratoga having put together one of the most memorable summers by a 3-year-old filly in recent memory.