Countdown to the Cup - Rachel Rocks the Spa

Joan of Arc defeated the English in the Hundred Years' War. The Amazon queen Penthesileia killed hundreds of Greeks in the Trojan War. Zenobia, the Syrian queen, crushed the Roman legion. All three of these powerful and feared female warriors eventually succumbed to male foes.

So far, the same cannot be said of Rachel Alexandra, who has decimated both male and female opponents in routs, has tasted victory on many of the nation's most storied battlefields, and now in the $750,000 Woodward Stakes (gr. I) Sept. 5 has shown she can conquer older males in hand-to-hand combat.

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