Gleneagles on the right track
THE forecast for an end to the current fine spell come Thursday evening looks like being more of a concern for trainers of good-ground star performers rather than the likely opposition heading for Irish Champions Weekend.
Leading figures in the sport are keeping their fingers firmly crossed that the equine elite liberally entered up for Leopardstown on Saturday and the Curragh the following afternoon won’t be rained upon.
The current good ground generally, and even a little firmer in places on the Curragh’s round course, would be a near-ideal scenario for the promoters of the €4 million Champions extravaganza successfully launched just a year ago.
Thursday morning’s 48-hour declaration deadline for both the Qipco Champion Stakes and the Coolmore Matron Stakes — which share centre stage at the Dublin track — will have passed, however, before any return to more changeable weather conditions.
Thus it’s odds-on that Aidan O’Brien will accept at that point with the long-absent Gleneagles as well as Highland Reel and possibly Found for the Qipco promotion, which he’s already won on a record seven occasions.
Newmarket-based John Gosden has already committed his Epsom Derby hero Golden Horn, which likewise excels on a sound surface, to a first appearance on Irish soil after coming through a weekend workout in some style.
Yorkshire-based Kevin Ryan — who proved the spoilsport for Ballydoyle hotpot Australia’s owners and backers 12 months ago with The Grey Gatsby — is also set to make the return journey.
Dermot Weld’s Free Eagle, one of the other prime ante-post fancies, and French veteran Cirrus Des Aigles along with the crack Irish fillies Legatissimo and Pleascach would come into the reckoning as things stand.
But the chances of David Elsworth’s Arabian Queen, shock conqueror of Golden Horn in the Juddmonte International at York, being supplemented f or the Champion Stakes don’t appear that bright as indications are that the east coast may escape any material rainfall before Saturday evening.
On the plus side there’s a similar hot contest in the pipeline for the Matron Stakes with David O’Meara’s Amazing Maria seek- ing to underline her tremendous rate of improvement this term by following up her wins at Ascot, Newmarket and most recently in Deauville where Olivier Peslier was particularly delighted with her.
French ace Peslier is more than happy to keep the partnership intact for Saturday’s mile test in which the daughter of Mastercraftsman could encounter David Wachman’s English Guineas heroine Legatissimo, which was a clear-cut scorer once more in t he Nassau Stakes at Goodwood. Withdrawn f rom Saturday’s Sprint Cup at Haydock, Eddie Lynam’s evergreen veterasn Sole Power has been re-routed, ground permitting, to Sunday’s Flying Five, which has been identified as the next port of call for Michael Halford’s Toscanini, runner-up there a year ago to Gleneagles for the National Stakes. There’s a very strong English raiding party, though, as York heroine Mecca’s Angel has the Group 2 race in her sights and William Haggas plans to bring Muthmir over as well.
5 times Dermot
Weld’s Free Eagle has
raced at Leopardstown, winning
twice