RACING: FRANKEL IN the QEII may be the headline act for Saturday's "Champions Day" bonanza at Ascot but So You Think looks set for a main supporting role in the Qipco Champion Stakes.
After emerging in “unbelievable form” from a fourth place finish in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, the ex-Australian star could be in line for a quick reappearance this weekend before then heading to the USA for the Breeders’ Cup Classic.
Aidan O’Brien has described the ambitious double attempt as being a “definite possible” and dismissed suggestions that a busy six-race season so far may be catching up with So You Think. “If it was up to me he would race every week such is his constitution,” the champion trainer said at the weekend. “He came out of the Arc in unbelievable form.”
So You Think is already as low as 7 to 4 favourite in some ante-post lists for the Champion despite the likely presence of the King George hero Nathaniel and the Henry Cecil pair Twice Over and Midday who dominated the finish of York’s Juddmonte International in August. It was a mixed weekend for O’Brien with a 25 to 1 Middle Park victory for Crusade at Newmarket but a narrow defeat for Power by Jim Bolger’s Parish Hall in the Dewhurst and another frustrating second for Together in America.
The Ballydoyle filly, already runner-up this year in both the English and Irish Guineas, as well as the Matron Stakes, again had to settle for second in Keeneland’s First Lady Stakes on Saturday night behind Never Retreat.
“It went very well. She travelled, tracked the winner and ran a very good race,” Together’s jockey Colm O’Dongohue reported.
O’Donoghue had a less happy time in the Shadwell Turf Mile as the O’Brien-trained Zoffany finished last of the eight runners behind America’s top grass performer Gio Ponti.
A Curragh workout this morning could determine whether or not John Oxx’s progressive young stayer Saddlers Rock will be supplemented into the Group Three Long Distance Cup at Ascot on Saturday. Saddlers Rock burst into the limelight with a four length defeat of Opinion Poll in last month’s Doncaster Cup and Oxx has indicted an €20,000 supplementary fee will be paid out if the horse impresses in today’s scheduled gallop and Ascot ground conditions look suitable.
Parish Hall has been installed a 25 to 1 shot for next year’s Guineas and Derby after providing Jim Bolger and Kevin Manning with a fourth Dewhurst victory in six years on Saturday. Bolger indicated, however, a Derby campaign rather than a return to Newmarket for the Guineas may be more likely for the son of Teofilo.
“He’s up there with my three previous winners of this race (Teofilo, New Approach and Intense Focus) and that will be it for the year. I’m not sure he’d come back for the Guineas but he has as good a chance as New Approach had of staying a mile-and-a-half. He’s a very sound horse and I’d be thinking of Epsom for him – and after that, the Curragh,” the trainer said.
