Makahiki did the barest of minimums here on Sunday but the latest star to emerge from Japan with the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe as his target remains on course for the big race on 2 October, having beaten Midterm by a neck in the Prix Niel.
It was far from spectacular, and for a brief moment inside the final furlong, it seemed that Makahiki might not find enough to overhaul Midterm, who was running for the first time since finishing only fifth when favourite for the Dante Stakes at York in May.
But Makahiki too was returning from a break, having been off the track since winning the Japanese Derby by a nose on 29 May. He kept responding on the run to the line here, and had more to spare at the post than the margin might imply.
Deep Impact, the sire of Makahiki, drew thousands of Japanese racing fans to Paris when he ran third in the Arc a decade ago. Having tried and failed several times to win the Arc at Longchamp, Japan will now hope to win it at Chantilly in three weeks’ time while the race’s traditional home is being rebuilt.
Christophe Lemaire, who will also ride Makahiki in the Arc, was confident after Sunday’s success that his partner will improve significantly by the first weekend in October.
“The margin was not big but we went quite fast in the last 200 metres, the pace was not very strong and I had three lengths to make at the end,” Lemaire said. “I was very glad with the way he reacted when I asked him to accelerate. He had to work at the end and I think it’s a good thing.
“I think he was fit enough to race in a Group Two, but he’d been a long time without running and we want him to be on top on the D-day, on Arc day. Today was just a step and I think he was 70%, 80% fit. I’m sure he will improve for the Arc.
“He’s a very clever and relaxed horse. He knows his job, he really does what you ask him to do and he preserves himself. Today he came very easily to the front and then just relaxed. He’s a typical mile-and-a-half horse, a big stride and then nice acceleration.”
Midterm could yet join Makahiki in the field for the Arc, as this was a much more encouraging performance than his run in the Dante, a race that he started as the ante-post favourite for the Derby. New Bay, last year’s French Derby winner, is another possible Arc runner in Prince Khalid Abdullah’s colours, however, and the Champion Stakes is an alternative target.
“He needed the race and he had a good blow afterwards,” Teddy Grimthorpe, “He enjoyed the whole experience, and he has two obvious options at the moment.
“It’s easy to forget that he was the Derby favourite at one stage. We hold him in that sort of calibre, anyway, but he’s still got to prove it. The two horses are not interdependent, we ran two in the Arc last year, but it’s up to the Prince what he wants to do.”
With the Arc in mind, Makahiki was the main attraction on the card of trial races over the big-race course and distance here, and his price to win Europe’s showpiece race is largely unchanged at around 8-1, although a couple of firms pushed him out to 10-1.
Left Hand, who took the Prix Vermeille, could head for the Prix de l’Opéra rather than the Arc, but is a 33-1 chance should her connections opt for the main event. The Prix Foy, for older horses, was won by Silverwave, the favourite, who is still available at 25-1 for the Arc in a market headed by Postponed, the International Stakes winner, at a best price of 9-2.
Almanzor, who beat an outstanding field to win Saturday’s Irish Champion Stakes, is the 6-1 second-favourite, even though Jean-Claude Rouget, his trainer, has yet to commit his colt to the race. Rouget also trains another leading Arc contender in the filly La Cressonniere, who is unbeaten in eight starts including both the French 1,000 Guineas and French Oaks, and the trainer suggested here on Sunday that “if it was up to me”, Almanzor would run instead in the 10-furlong Champion Stakes at Ascot on Champions Day.
It is not up to him, however. Instead, it is Antonio Caro, who in effect owns both horses though they race in different colours, who will choose between splitting them up to chase two huge prizes, or doubling his chance to win the Arc. The decision will boil down to how much he wants an Arc. If the answer is “more than anything”, he is likely to be double-handed on 2 October.
On the second day of Ireland’s Champions weekend, the 25-1 chance Intricately was the surprise winner of the Group One Moyglare Stud Stakes, giving Aidan O’Brien’s two sons, Joseph and Donnacha, their first Group One successes as a trainer and jockey respectively.
“This means the world to me,” Joseph O’Brien, who also rode two Derby winners for his father before he was forced into retirement by weight problems, said. “It’s Donnacha’s first Group One and my mum bred her. She’s very tough and Donnacha was very strong on her.
“She’s in the Fillies’ Mile at Newmarket, and we’ll see how she comes out of this. She doesn’t have to run again this season. I can’t believe she was 25-1 as she was only a length behind the second-favourite [Rhododendron] the last day. You probably get a bigger kick out of training winners than riding them, as a lot more work goes into it.”
O’Brien Sr, whose Hydrangea was the narrow runner-up to Intricately, took the Group One National Stakes with Churchill, who pulled four and a quarter lengths clear of Mehmas to enhance his claims for next year’s Derby, but the trainer suffered a major setback when Order Of St George, the 1-7 favourite, could finish only second behind Willie Mullins’s Wicklow Brave in the Irish St Leger.
Frankie Dettori, the winning jockey, said: “I didn’t expect that, honestly! He was very brave and Willie gave me free rein and said if you want to go to the front and do your stuff, work away – I was quite surprised that I didn’t hear anybody coming until about a furlong to go and we ground it out in the end.”
Mullins said: “Frankie was fantastic, as he is always is. He rode my father’s Classic winner here, Vintage Tipple [Irish Oaks in 2003], and I think that was his first Irish St Leger winner.
The trainer added: “Ruby [Walsh] rode him in his last bit of work and he said there may not be anything to make the running. We have been holding him up all our lives and he often doesn’t produce what it looks like he will.
“Hopefully it will be the Melbourne Cup next. That has been the plan all year as the pace and the ground will suit.”
