Grand Slam Smile swings for a 9th stakes win on Saturday
At 0h33, on March 20, 2026 • By Santa Anita Park
Top California-bred mare Grand Slam Smile looms as a heavy favorite Saturday when she goes for a ninth stakes win in the $100,000 Irish O’Brien Stakes for statebred fillies and mares going about 6 ½ furlongs on the hillside turf course at Santa Anita.
Trained by Sean McCarthy, Grand Slam Smile is back in with statebreds after testing the GII Buena Vista on Feb. 28 at Santa Anita. In the Buena Vista going one mile on turf, Grand Slam Smile set the pace and led into the stretch before being overtaken late to finish third. It was the second graded-stakes placing for the ultra-consistent 5-year-old Smiling Tiger mare. Owned and bred by Larry D. Williams and Marianne Williams, Grand Slam Smile is 18: 10-6-2 with $852,120 in earnings. Returning to Santa Anita to ride Grand Slam Smile on Saturday is William Antongeorgi III, who earlier this year relocated to Turfway Park.
Prior to the Buena Vista try, Grand Slam Smile won the Sunshine Millions Filly & Mare Turf Sprint for statebreds on the hillside turf course in January. The respective second- and third-place finisher that day, Take Another Card and Prancingthruparis, both get another crack at Grand Slam Smile in the Irish O’Brien.
