Hillstar won the Canadian International on Sunday for Sir Michael Stoute and Ryan Moore but the night turned into a disaster for Michael Owen, whose Brown Panther was prevented from taking part after dropping his jockey before the start. The former footballer’s horse, trained in Cheshire by Tom Dascombe, was well fancied for the race, having won the Irish St Leger by six lengths last month.
“Long way to come for nothing!” Owen tweeted minutes after the incident. “Thank goodness horse and jockey are both okay.” Owen had travelled to Toronto despite the logistical difficulties of squeezing the trip in between football punditry work in Britain on Saturday and Monday.
A veteran of 24 races over four years, Brown Panther bolted on his way to the start, unseating Richard Kingscote and then running loose. The six-year-old was almost immediately taken out of the race.
Owen’s ambition is for Brown Panther to have a stallion career and victory in the race at Woodbine would certainly have improved his prospects in that sphere. There was no word on what the horse would be asked to do next but Owen has mooted a trip to the Breeders’ Cup in California in just under a fortnight’s time.
In Brown Panther’s absence, Hillstar was sent off at odds of 6-5 and justified his position as favourite by sweeping past his rivals up the middle of the home straight. The prize money of £340,909 comes close to doubling his career earnings from 14 races so far.
Stoute won the Canadian International with Singspiel in 1996 and the race has generally been good to British challengers. Joshua Tree has won it for the past two years for two different Newmarket trainers: Marco Botti in 2012 and Ed Dunlop last year.
Moore was aboard Joshua Tree last year and becomes the first jockey to win consecutive runnings of the International since 1957. “The boss said this race was a target for the horse a long way out and it’s always something we had in the back of our minds for him, if things were going well,” the jockey told local TV. “I moved a bit too early today but he was the best horse and we just kept it straightforward.”
It turned into a big night for Newmarket trainers, as David Simcock won the Grade Two Nearctic Stakes with Caspar Netscher, which was returning to action this year after a failed attempt at a stallion career. The £102,273 prize was the biggest in the career of jockey Andrew Mullen, who was riding in North America for the first time and is due to have a hip operation in Cambridge on Tuesday.
British trainers completed a sweep of the card’s major prizes when Just The Judge won the EP Taylor Stakes for the Lambourn-based Charlie Hills. The race provided a late-career high for the filly’s jockey, Jamie Spencer, who is due to retire at the end of the year for an organisational role with Qatar Racing, owners of Just The Judge.
Spencer won a top-class race for the first time in 11 months but was arguably lucky to retain the prize after having to push a rival aside in the closing stages to obtain running room.
British trainers completed a sweep of the card’s major prizes when Just The Judge won the EP Taylor Stakes for the Lambourn-based Charlie Hills. The race provided a late-career high for the filly’s jockey, Jamie Spencer, who is due to retire at the end of the year for an organisational role with Qatar Racing, owners of Just The Judge.
Spencer won a top-class race for the first time in 11 months but was arguably lucky to retain the prize after having to push a rival aside in the closing stages to obtain running room.
