Auguste Rodin’s career has been a case of ‘all or nothing’ but Aidan O’Brien will hope it finishes on a fulsome note at Saturday night’s Breeders’ Cup in Santa Anita in California.
The $4 million Turf over a mile and a half is one of three races featuring Irish runners on an epic Breeders’ Cup programme that features nine Grade One contests in all, and will be broadcast live on ITV4.
O’Brien and his son Joseph will be represented by Warm Heart and Lumiere Rock respectively in the $2 million Filly & Mare Turf contest due off at 7.10 Irish time.
After the featured $6 million Classic is run on dirt, Ballydoyle’s Aesop’s Fables will take his chance in the Turf Sprint (11.25) down the famous Santa Anita hill.
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However, on a card laden with the greatest US talent, with a liberal sprinkling of some of the best in Europe and Japan thrown in, it won’t be just Irish eyes intently focusing on the Turf off at 9.50.
Although Frankie Dettori and King Of Steel will invariably attract attention on the back of their Champion Stakes heroics a fortnight ago, and another British hope in Mostahdaf will join France’s Onesto in the contest, Auguste Rodin’s position as headline act looks secure.
Although one of Auguste Rodin’s stable companions Bolshoi Ballet has been scratched from the race on veterinary advice, the regally bred son of Deep Impact and Rhododendron will be joined by another, Broome, as he tries to emulate a Ballydoyle star of the past.
High Chaparral pulled off back-to-back Turf victories when memorably dead-heating with Johar in a monumental Santa Anita finish 20 years ago.
He remains the only Epsom Derby winner to win at the Breeders’ Cup, although at this 40th renewal Auguste Rodin, who is set to be retired to stud afterwards, has a shot at emulating such a feat.
Over the decades, a quartet of other Derby heroes – Dr Devious, Quest For Fame, Golden Horn and Anthony Van Dyck – have come up short in the Turf. Galileo finished out of the places in the 2001 Classic.
An end of season American tilt was a comparative afterthought for most of them, but this has been the target for Auguste Rodin since his Irish Champion Stakes victory at Leopardstown in September.
A desire for fast ground meant skipping the Arc which ironically got run on the fastest conditions seen for years at Longchamp in October.
Quick conditions are assured in southern California; what isn’t is which Auguste Rodin will turn up?
The one that holds King Of Steel and Onesto on form would be a deserved favourite to win. A pair of Derby victories, as well as his Irish Champion Stakes success, underlines how he is a top-class colt at his best. But he has also tested O’Brien’s skills like few others this season.
Getting him back to Epsom glory after a bitter flop in the Guineas was a superb feat. Doing it again at Leoapardstown after the horse was all but pulled up in the King George at Ascot in July was remarkable.
Plenty of theories still swirl around Auguste Rodin’s handsome head as to why he has thrown in two such stinkers. Blaming soft ground has got mixed with an apparent aversion to flying, hardly an encouragement for his chances given a 6,000-mile flight to Los Angeles.
What isn’t in doubt at all, though, is O’Brien’s superb race record with six victories in all, the last of them was 2016 with Highland Reel.
A year ago, O’Brien broke his duck in the Filly & Mare with Tuesday. This time Warm Heart is his hope, and she drops back in trip after wins in the Yorkshire Oaks and Prix Vermeille.
“I imagine Ryan [Moore] will go forward on her and probably whatever comes to beat her will have to get the trip well. I would say he will probably go early on her and she does get it well. She doesn’t lie down and she does fight,” said O’Brien.
Although the international racing bandwagon proceeds to the Melbourne Cup in the early hours of Tuesday morning, the formal end of Ireland’s flat season takes place at the Curragh on Sunday.
O’Brien’s perennial status at the country’s champion trainer looks more secure than ever and he tops the table for a 26th time with over €6.7 million in prizemoney and more than a hundred winners.
Colin Keane is champion jockey for a fifth time while Jamie Powell is the season’s leading apprentice.
Considering the Curragh was forced to cancel a meeting in July due to waterlogging, it’s hardly a surprise conditions at HQ will be testing on Sunday where there is free entry for all racegoers.
Sunday’s big race sponsorship is a reminder too of a turbulent 2023, with seven lining up for the Group Three Comer Group Loughbrown Stakes.
Monaco based businessman Luke Comer, who is appealing a three-year suspension of his license to train after 12 of his string tested positive for anabolic steroids, will be represented by Alexander John in an earlier conditions event.
