By Byron King – Courtesy of Bloodhorse.com Arcadia, CA (March 13, 2020) – Queen Bee to You, who rose up the stakes ranks to become a dual graded stakes winner this winter in Southern California, has been retired due to a minor right ankle injury, according to trainer Andrew Lerner.

Winner of the Bayakoa Stakes (G3) and La Canada Stakes (G3) under jockey Ruben Fuentes, the 6-year-old Old Topper mare had been pointed toward the March 14 Beholder Mile Stakes (G1) at Santa Anita Park before she exhibited inflammation in her ankle March 4 after a six-furlong workout in 1:13 4/5.

“It was nothing serious. I would have recommended to the owners to turn her out for 60 or 90 days, bring her back and let her roll again,” Lerner said. “But we’re kind of at the point where we decided to run her this year and if we had done that we might have gotten one or two races in her anyway before going in the November sale.

“It made more sense to take her out of training now and get her bred to a nice stallion in Kentucky and let her have her life as a momma.”

A breeding decision for the mare and where she will board is pending from owners Christopher St. Hilaire and Adam Vali, Lerner said. Next week she travels to Kentucky, where most of the major stud farms are located.

St. Hilaire currently races his horses under the stable name An Equal Amount of Blueberries, a line from the movie “Casino.”

Bred in California by Tommy Town Thoroughbreds, Queen Bee to You is the sixth foal out of the Touch Gold mare Silk Queen and the first to earn black type. She made her first four starts for her breeder before being claimed by St. Hilaire for $50,000 as a maiden in December 2016. She has made $658,770, winning eight of 33 races over her entire career.

Queen Bee to You closed her career with three consecutive victories, going 4-for-7 after Lerner took over her training from Mike Pender in June 2019. She provided Lerner with the first graded victories of his young training career.