Warming stays hot scoring Dance Smartly win in Woodbine debut

03/10/2026

TORONTO, October 3, 2026 - Maryland shipper Warming continued a scorching campaign across North America by capturing the bet365 Dance Smartly Stakes (Grade 2) Saturday at Woodbine.

The $200,000 race, named for Canada's first Breeders’ Cup winner, drew a field of seven fillies and mares, three-year-olds and upward.

Surprisingly, it was Proctor Street and Eponine (IRE), the 1-2 off the pace finishers in the Grade 2 Canadian Stakes, who showed the way up front early. Proctor Street, who won that event at Woodbine on August 15th by a neck over Eponine (IRE), led the latter by a length through an opening quarter mile in :25.05, in the one and one sixteenth miles, turf route over an E.P. Taylor Turf Course listed “Good”.

Power of Destiny (GB), Ozara (IRE), Warming, Elysian Field and Pin Up Betty followed the top pair in that order through the first two panels.

Proctor Street, under Pietro Moran continued to lead through a half mile in :50.31 and carried that speed to the top of the lane in a six-furlong split of 1:14.21.

The Graham Motion trained Warming, fresh off a last to first win in the Grade 2 Yellow Ribbon Stakes at Del Mar on August 8th, was enjoying an ideal ground saving trip in fifth and began to rally up the fence.

Inside the quarter pole, Fraser Aebly steadily angled the white-blazed chestnut off the rail, with the tandem finding a seam in the four path and exploding by Proctor Street to score by a length and three quarters over a late, rail rallying Power of Destiny (GB). The mile time was 1:37.46. The final running time was 1:43.78.

Riding the four-year-old daughter of Global Campaign for the first time, Aebly was asked post-race if he was worried about a lack of early pace in the race.

"The way she was traveling for me down the backside, I wasn't worried at all," said Aebly, who helped improve Warming’s record to a perfect 4 for 4 at eight and half furlongs on turf. “She definitely has a very good turn of foot.”

"As soon as I asked her at the head of the lane, she kind of found a seam. She kicked very hard for me, it was very nice to see," added Aebly.

Appearing at her sixth different racetrack in 2026, Warming added her second straight Grade 2 win, following the Yellow Ribbon triumph. Two starts prior, the Kentucky-bred won the Grade 3 Gallorette at Laurel Park. The Dance Smartly victory improved Warming's record to 3-1-2 from six starts during her 4-year-old campaign.

"She shipped up so well," said Ian Wilson, Motion's assistant trainer. “She's gone all over the country. This is just another day, another business day for her."

Bred in Kentucky by M. Auerbach, LLC and owned by Eclipse Thoroughbred Partners, Warming (Global Campaign – Haute Style, by Unusual Heat) improved to 6-1-3 from 14 career starts, while earning automatic entry into the 2027 Pegasus World Cup Filly & Mare Turf Invitational Stakes (G2T), slated for January at Gulfstream Park.

Listed at 2-1 on the Woodbine morning line, Warming went off at 2.35 to 1 and returned $6.70 for the win. Power of Destiny (GB) was second. Proctor Street held for third. And Elysian Field completed the superfecta.

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Phil McSween, for Woodbine