Saxon Warrior is likely to be joined by three stablemates when he lines up as the favourite for the Derby next month, Aidan O’Brien said on Monday.
The trainer explained he has to have “backups” in case anything happens to his main contender for the Investec‑sponsored Classic but this should not be read as showing any lack of confidence in Saxon Warrior, for whom he was full of praise.
While conceding he has yet to discuss it with “the lads” of Coolmore who employ him, O’Brien listed his other likely Derby contenders as The Pentagon, Delano Roosevelt and Kew Gardens.
“I’m just trying to pre-empt the way the lads will be thinking,” O’Brien said. “I thought maybe Rostropovich might go to the French Derby. And then something might go with him.”
O’Brien expects to run two others, James Cook and Zabriskie, in the Dante Stakes at York on Thursday and conceded they or others could yet come into the Derby reckoning. But perhaps those two colts will serve their trainer better as markers to tell him how good the Dante form is. “Some horses, we hold back for Ascot. But the Derby is the race everyone will be looking at and we have Saxon Warrior.
“But we have to have backups in case things don’t keep.” He stopped short of actually verbalising the possibility of injury to the Guineas winner.
His rivals may not have noticed but O’Brien, seeking his seventh Derby success, reports that he has had a troubled start to the year, the turf on his grass gallops remaining so sodden that he has been unable to use it. He cannot remember having been restricted to all-weather gallops at such an advanced stage of the season and reckons his horses have been held up in their preparation as a result.
That, O’Brien says, was the main source of doubt about Saxon Warrior when he lined up for the 2,000 Guineas. “For him to do what he did, we were delighted. Looking at him, there should have been an awful lot of improvement to come.”
Admiring the colt, who grew so impressively over the winter, O’Brien said: “He’s a very sober, relaxed horse but sharp – he reacts to things very quickly. Most horses live in a middle ground. He lives asleep and he lives alive. That middle ground, he doesn’t have that.
“It makes him very easy to deal with, because he’s asleep all the time. He’s a big, good-natured horse, really, but he has that quickness and the sharpness that good horses have. He doesn’t have to go from first to second to third to fourth gear, he can go from second to fifth in a flash. It’s an impulse.”
O’Brien was happy to contemplate the possibility of Saxon Warrior trying to become the first triple crown winner since Nijinsky in 1970, which would require him to win the Derby and the St Leger. The latter race is not the most commercially obvious target with his future as a stallion in mind, but the trainer does not expect Coolmore to be deterred by that. “It’s kind of a romantic thing rather than a business thing,” he said, pointing out that Nijinksy’s statue guards the gates here.
But any horse can be unlucky in a race and O’Brien is now trying to reformulate plans for U S Navy Flag, whose chance in the French 2,000 Guineas on Sunday was compromised when he slipped on the Longchamp turf, which has attracted criticism from jockeys. “It would have been a disaster if he fell,” said O’Brien, who declined to blame anyone.
Sedgefield 2.00 Miss Benefitz 2.30 Citadel 3.00 Francky Du Berlais 3.30 Gris De Pron 4.00 Tickerty Boo 4.30 General Mahler 5.00 Master Debonair
Beverley 2.10 Deep Intrigue 2.40 Ahlan Bil Emarati 3.10 Ce De Nullis 3.40 Racquet 4.10 Fieldsman 4.40 Juneau (nap) 5.10 Contrebasse (nb) 5.45 Bayshore Freeway
Wincanton 2.20 The Detainee 2.50 Ruby Russet 3.20 Whatthebutlersaw 3.50 Indian Hawk 4.20 Bramble Brook 4.50 Rose Crown 5.20 Unioniste
Chepstow 5.15 Molly Blake 5.50 Maypole 6.20 Sir Roderic 6.50 Awesome Allan 7.20 Can Can Sixty Two 7.50 Miss Inga Sock 8.20 Bailarico
Southwell 5.30 Too Many Diamonds 6.00 Golden Vision 6.30 Galway Jack 7.00 Arthur’s Reuben 7.30 Settie Hill 8.00 The Lady Rules 8.30 Notnow Seamus
Tips by Chris Cook.
