Equinties - the big double

Gm Equinauts

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Every one at Equinties.

HEADLINE ROUND UP

THE BIG DOUBLE

MILL REEF (1971), STAR APPEAL (1975), DANCING BRAVE (1986), SEA THE STARS (2009), and GOLDEN HORN (2015). Five horses have won Coral-Eclipse and Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe in the same year since 1970. It could have been six in 2019, though WALDGEIST got the better of ENABLE.

At least that result created the infamous Racing Blogger video!

A deeper look into the Coral-Eclipse shows that it is a good trial for the Arc, even if some horses don’t win both races in the same year.

VADENI won the Eclipse in 2022 and then went on to finish second to ALPINISTA at Longchamp, and ENABLE was second in the Eclipse in 2018 before winning the Arc.

Furthermore, as we all know, trainers are creatures of habit. For example, John Gosden has used the Eclipse for potential Arc horses before, notably with the previously mentioned GOLDEN HORN and ENABLE.

So, how could this weekend’s Eclipse affect the current Arc scene, and more importantly, the current ante-post market?

Because ANMAAT and ALMAQAM were not declared yesterday, let’s start with the Ballydoyle contenders. News arrived yesterday confirming that Ryan Moore will ride DELACROIX over CAMILLE PISSARRO, which would read negatively towards the latter. Jockey bookings aren’t gospel pieces of information, but in this case, it’s really notable.

And then there’s the record of three-year-olds in the Arc. ACE IMPACT, ENABLE, GOLDEN HORN, TREVE, DANEDREAM, WORKFORCE, SEA THE STARS, and ZARKARVA are the last eight three-year-old winners of the Arc.

What do they all have in common? They were world-class animals.

Could the same be said for HOTAZHELL, RULING COURT, DELACROIX, and CAMILLE PISSARRO? The latter three are undoubtedly nice horses, but RULING COURT and DELACROIX need to bounce back from below-par efforts lto, and CAMILLE PISSARRO needs to show he can improve past his French Derby win. They’re not really for us, in terms of the Arc.

So, if we’re being picky, two horses could conceivably do the Eclipse-Arc double this year. OMBUDSMAN (20/1 for the Arc) and SOSIE (10/1 for the Arc).

OMBUDSMAN is the big talking horse of the moment, and he is ground versatile, so he should handle any type of surface at Longchamp in October. He’s never tried 1m4f, and NIGHT OF THUNDER isn’t a prolific producer of horses at that trip. The horses that did stay the trip include THUNDEROUS, who placed behind STRADIVARIUS in the 2022 Yorkshire Cup, THUNDER KISS, who chased home EMILY UPJOHN in the 2022 British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes, and ESTRANGE, who could be an Arc horse herself this year. In fairness, the way he races could suit an Arc. He switches off away from the front-end, and he makes a late charge to pick up the pieces. ACE IMPACT, TORQUATOR TASSO, and WALDGEIST all did something similar during their Arc wins.

As for SOSIE, one can imagine that the Arc is the season-long plan having finished fourth in the race last year. He won two races over the trip in the lead-up to last year’s contest, so he has to be a contender. He also won on fairly quick ground in the Group 1 Prix d’Ispahan recently, and he is a three-time winner on soft ground. With another year of experience and growing on his side, he could be a proper contender for the Arc.
So, that’s our summation of this weekend’s Coral Eclipse with our Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe-tinted glasses on. The Arc is a season-defining race, so it deserves its fair share of hype, especially when there are races that directly affect it.

To us, SOSIE looks to have a leading chance this weekend and in Longchamp’s feature race. Because it’s a related double, bookmakers won’t lay an ante-post double on him to win the Eclipse and the Arc, though if they did, the price would roughly be 54/1.

BIG TALK

“He’s the best I have had.” Whenever you hear these comments, there are a few things that come to mind.

Who let Richard Hannon on the mic again? Which soon-to-be stallion is Aidan O’Brien trying to hype up again? How many ‘good horses’ has this trainer actually had?

In this case, the latter is applicable. That’s because Andrew Slattery, a well-respected trainer in Ireland, has labelled POWERFUL NATION, a three-year-old Listed-winning sprinter by SIOUX NATION, “the best I have had”.

So, who can Slattery compare the horse against? Officially, POWERFUL NATION has achieved the highest RPR of any of his horses (114), closely followed by EASY (110), a Listed winner over six furlongs at Cork in March 2024.

He also trained CREGGS PIPES to win the Group 2 Lanwades Stud Stakes in 2017 over a mile.

Why are we mentioning this? Well, Slattery thinks so much of the horse that he has Group 1 aspirations. He said: “I thought Easy was very fast, but this guy has speed on another level. It doesn’t matter how fast they go, they are not able to go fast enough for him.

“He wasn’t gunned as a two-year-old because he has a good pedigree, but a lot of them were good two-year-olds and didn’t train on. This fella has been trained to improve and I think he has.”

"He's been trained all season for the Flying Five in September. He'll run in the Sapphire Stakes on July 19 next and hopefully our dream is still alive after that. I might give him a run in between those two races because he gets very fresh at home.

"A lot of people are telling me that he's an ideal horse for the Nunthorpe and that falls within the intervening period, but I have it in the back of my mind to keep him at home until after the Flying Five and then maybe have a go at the Prix de l'Abbaye. Things might change, but at the moment he will be staying at home.”
To mention these races is a big deal. We’ve seen BELIEVING retire this year, the same goes for STARLUST, and BRADSELL retired at the end of last season.

AMERICAN AFFAIR is still open to being taken on, and the likes of INISHERIN and SYMBOL OF HONOUR aren’t bombproof. LAZZAT does look very good, to be fair, but the sprinting division is open to having a crack at it, and why not do it with an unexposed horse like POWERFUL NATION?

OISIN MURPHY

And finally, we received an update from the Oisin Murphy drink driving case yesterday. To be honest, there isn’t much to add to the situation other than the bare facts, so we’ll just share the information here.

The four-time champion jockey has been handed a £70,000 fine and a 20-month driving ban after pleading guilty to the drink-driving offence. From his POV, this will be a fine result.

Yes, the lack of driving will be an inconvenience, but he will just pay someone to be his driver while this ban lasts, and £70k is no harm done considering how much he’s paid by Qatar on his retainer.

This whole situation is all rather disappointing. Murphy is great with racegoers, he’s one of the worlds best talents in the saddle, and he is good with the media in most scenarios (away from this one, for obvious reasons). He, alongside someone like Billy Loughnane, would be perfect to market Flat racing around to engage a wider audience, very similar to what Frankie Dettori was for so many years.

Frankie was by no means a saint, clearly, but Murphy keeps making these mistakes and then asking for forgiveness with the general racing public. All we can do is hope that Murphy starts to put together a positive run of things, with some help from those closest to him.

STATS OF THE DAY

In the 18.15, VENTURA EXPRESS goes for the race three timer having won it in ‘22 and ‘24 (he didn’t run in the ‘23 running). If you watch his last race back, he looks well primed to go well today!

Nicholls is the ‘hottest’ trainer right now having landed 2 winners from his 3 recent runners and has a few going to Newton Abbot tonight where he lands more than 1 in 3. KEEL STRAND makes appeal and looks well handicapped in his point form. Jay Tidball rides who has a useful claim - he’s 4 from 6 for big Paul this year. Cobden rides two in DANCINGONTHEEDGE and SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS but there are counter stats for other trainers in the same races, even though the former won the race last year and SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS does admittedly look the best in the race. Nicholls to have a good day.

RISK ON

The stats are strong today and we wouldn’t put anyone off looking to play them in some form. Else where we like:

16.10 WINDLORD

Been mixing it with the big boys and a drop in Grade to Listed level is intriguing enough to bet. He was placed in the Classic trial at Sandown in April and ran a fine race at the Curragh the time before. Get’s the handy weight for age allowance and he’ll take a lot of beating from a yard bang in form.

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