Equinties - the Irish Champion

Gm Equinauts

The better racing is coming. Newbury tomorrow and then two days of quality at Sandown featuring the Solario Stakes.

The Gosden’s won the Solario Stakes last year with Juddmonte’s FIELD OF GOLD, will connections grab the Group 3 prize again with hot fave PUBLISH?

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Let’s dive in.

HEADLINE ROUNDUP

ENTRIES AND MORE ENTRIES

We got two sets of entries for two of the biggest races left in the calendar yesterday, and there was a minor surprise.

The surprise involves ‘that’ horse OMBUDSMAN, as John & Thady Gosden are not keen on running their Juddmonte International hero in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.

In a weird way, we kind of get this. Yes, he won the Group 1 Prince Of Wales’s Stakes very impressively, and he wasn’t stopping in the Juddmonte International over the same 1m2f distance, but he isn’t a guaranteed stayer in a 1m4f Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, especially if it goes soft.

John Gosden obviously thought the pace was wrong for him in the Coral-Eclipse over 1m2f, and that’s why they employed a pacemaker in the Juddmonte. Furthermore, let’s not forget that the Prince Of Wales’s was a huge pace collapse that favoured both OMBUDSMAN and ANMAAT from the rear of the field.

Dower stayers at 1m4f have either won the Arc or gone very close in it over the last few years, and OMBUDSMAN is untested at that trip. Asking him to travel over to France for your 1m4f debut in a sloppy Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe would be fairly mental.

No decision has been made on his next run, but he is entered for the Irish Champion, and that would seem like a logical step.

We also received the St Leger entries yesterday, and of the 15 still left in the race, only five are trained in Britain. Pretty worrying.

To be fair, all the expected horses are in there. Aidan O’Brien has left SCANDINAVIA and LAMBOURN in the contest as well as MINNIE HAUK, the Great Voltigeur gang of CARMERS, ARABIAN FORCE, and STAY TRUE are there, and the Epsom Derby 2-3 of TENNESSEE STUD and LAZY GRIFF are on the teamsheet.

It doesn’t look like an inspiring renewal this year, and it almost makes you wish that PRIDE OF ARRAS still had his private parts attached!

The Leger really is turning into a bit of a drab contest. It would be nice to get a potential triple crown horse arise at some stage soon, but with the way we are breeding our horses over here, there’s minimal chance of this occurring.

THE IRISH CHAMPION

Speaking of the Irish Champion Stakes, this year’s race could be, yet again, another great renewal.

ECONOMICS produced a great race with AUGUSTE RODIN and SHIN EMPEROR last year, AUGUSTE RODIN edged out LUXEMBOURG in the 2023 rendition, LUXEMBOURG beat ONESTO and VADENI in 2022, and ST MARK’S BASILICA battled past TARNAWA and POETIC FLARE in a proper four-runner contest.

It seems like the Irish Champion always gets a good field, and at the moment, there is no need to worry about this year’s contest.

For starters, as we’ve already said, OMBUDSMAN could head here, but so could DELACROIX, the runner-up in last week’s Juddmonte International.

Yesterday, we heard that SHIN EMPEROR will head back to Leopardstown after his good third in last year’s race, and the Aga Khan are set to be represented by ZAHRANN, an impressive winner of the Group 2 Royal Whip Stakes earlier this month.

And finally, the likes of ANMAAT, LOS ANGELES, ROYAL CHAMPION, and SEE THE FIRE are entered as well, any one of whom could add a bit more spice to proceedings.

It is fairly bold for connections to target ZAHRANN at the Irish Champion Stakes, considering just how strong the race could be. He has only won a Group 3 after all, but to be fair, where else would they go? There are no more 1m2f Group 2s in the UK or Ireland, and the only other race they could maybe (and we say this loosely) go to is the Group 3 Darley Stakes over 1m1f at Newmarket in October under a penalty.

Why would you go there is you can just go to a Group 1 under no penalty instead?

“At the moment Leopardstown is the plan and our thinking behind running in the Royal Whip was to see if he could earn a spot in the Irish Champion and we think he did,” said Pat Downes, general manager at the Aga Khan’s Irish studs.

“It’s obviously looking like being a strong race, as it always is, but we’re excited to let him take his chance and see what happens.

“We certainly feel there is more improvement to come, as you need with three-year-olds at this time of the year. He possibly still looked a bit raw the last day at the Curragh, but we were really happy with his win and we’re now looking forward to what he can do against top company.

“We’ll learn a lot about him in that race.”

BACK TO KEMPTON

Whether you want to believe it or not, the jumps are on their way. It’s roughly a month and a half until Chepstow has its new three-day jumps season opener, and wherever you look on Twitter, people are readying their horses to follow for the season.
It’s pretty grim at this stage of the calendar, if we’re honest. We haven’t even had the Leger yet!

But, some news is still relevant, and one piece of content caught our eye yesterday and the post was related to IL EST FRANCAIS, second in last year’s King George on Boxing Day.

As if this comes as a surprise, the seven-year-old will be targeted back to Kempton for the Christmas time treat, but his prep will be a lot different. Last year, Noel George & Amanda Zetterholm ran him in a 2m6f heavy ground race at Auteuil in September, which he won, before going for the Grade 1 Prix de la Haye Jousselin over 3m3f at the same track. He pulled up before the fifth last, which was obviously a very poor run, and that must have affected what connections have planned for him this year.

Why do we say this? Well, firstly, it seems like they are admitting that he is better right-handed (which could rule out a few Grade 1s at Auteuil, unless they decide to chance him again), and they could actually bring him over for the Haldon Gold Cup at Exeter as a prep run for the King George.

Exeter? In November? Over two miles? Now that is planning. George said: “He will return to France in September – we will see if he runs over hurdles. If not, we have a good race for him, the Haldon Gold Cup.

“His big objective will be to return to the King George VI Chase at Kempton, a racecourse he loves. He is indeed better right-handed. He had a great summer and is magnificent at the moment.”

If he went for the Haldon Gold Cup, that would be pretty cool. Connections rolled the dice with the Ryanair Chase in March, and that went pretty badly, though let’s not forget that they were debating the Champion Chase for a long while.

With an official rating of 166, he could buck out from the front and set a ‘catch me if you can’ tempo. For an early-season race, that would be some watch!

RISK ON

Our 10/1 ew yesterday got our stake back plus a beer as Teal’s certainly proved one to follow after placing from a troubled beginning.

Today we’re doing something similar:

18.37 FERMOY

The fave SARAB STAR should win this, so if you want to have a good stake on at 8/11, we wouldn’t put you off. But the field presents an opportunity for a nice priced ew swing and that’s in FERMOY for Coakley. This lad is reportedly working well enough to place. Other than the Crisford horse the rest look a bit useless. 11/1 ew and 2/1 place bet.

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