Richard Hughes, the champion jockey, will get a final chance to win the King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes a week before he retires from the saddle after he was booked to ride Eagle Top, the second-favourite, against the Derby winner Golden Horn at Ascot on Saturday.
John Gosden, the trainer of both Eagle Top and Golden Horn, turned to Hughes to partner Eagle Top after William Buick, Gosden’s stable jockey until the start of this season, was claimed to ride Romsdal for Godolphin. Frankie Dettori, Gosden’s principal rider this season, will maintain his unbeaten partnership with Golden Horn.
Hughes has yet to win the King George, the Group One middle-distance highlight of the summer season at Ascot. He finished second on Youmzain behind the 5-4 favourite Dylan Thomas in 2007, and third on the same horse behind another hot favourite, Duke Of Marmalade, a year later.
Golden Horn is generally a 1-2 chance to win on Saturday and become only the fourth horse to win the Derby, Eclipse Stakes and King George in the same season since the foundation of the Ascot race in 1951. Eagle Top is top-priced at 8-1 alongside Snow Sky, who beat him by nearly four lengths in the Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot last month.
The bare form of that race suggests that Eagle Top is unlikely to reverse the placings on Saturday, but Snow Sky benefited from a flawless front-running ride by Pat Smullen while Eagle Top, with Dettori riding, was involved in jostling with Luca Cumani’s Postponed in the early stages. Postponed is also in the line-up for Saturday’s race, but Adam Kirby, who rode him at the Royal meeting, has been replaced by Andrea Atzeni.
Eagle Top was also lined up for the King George 12 months ago, when his owner, Lady Bamford, paid £75,000 to supplement him to the field after an impressive win in the King Edward VII Stakes at Royal Ascot. He started at 4-1 and finished strongly from off the pace to be fourth of eight runners behind Taghrooda, also trained by Gosden, but did not race again as a three-year-old because the race “took a bit too much out of him” according to Hugo Lascelles, Lady Bamford’s racing manager.
“It’s a great ride to get,” Hughes said on Thursday. “He’s got a great chance. He looked a bit unlucky at Ascot but this is a different race on Saturday. He’s a good stayer and he’s won at Ascot, so he ticks a lot of boxes if he’s good enough. John’s very good with this sort of horse, he only puts them in the race when they’re ready to go in the race.”
Kirby, who replaced Atzeni this season as first jockey to Postponed’s owner Sheikh Mohammed Obaid, said on Thursday that he respects his employer’s decision to replace him in Saturday’s big race.
Speaking on Attheraces after winning a fillies’ maiden at Wolverhampton aboard the Sheikh’s Handbell, Kirby said: “It’s a little bit unfortunate but what can I say? The owner feels Andrea knows him and he fancies a change. I can’t blame him for that and I wish him and the boss all the best.
“I’ve had three goes [on Postponed] and each time there’s been no gallop which is not ideal. Last time it was a bit messy off a very slow gallop but that’s that. I think you’ll see a different animal with a strong pace. He deserves a big one.”
There were 10 final declarations for the King George on Thursday, with only Telescope, who suffered a minor setback earlier in the week, missing from the five-day entries. The ground at Ascot could change markedly before the race, however, with significant rain forecast for the area from Friday morning.
The Met Office has issued a severe weather warning for the Ascot area on Friday afternoon and forecasts heavy rain at the track from as early as 7am until Friday evening. The official going at Ascot for Friday’s card is good-to-firm, good in places.
Cheltenham’s National Hunt Festival meeting in March will have seven races on all four days following the announcement that a novice hurdle for fillies and mares will be added to the programme for the third afternoon.
The Grade Two £75,000 Trull House Stud Mares’ Novice Hurdle will be the sixth race on the card on 17 March. It will replace the St Patrick’s Derby, the Festival’s charity race, which has been staged on the third day of the meeting for the last six years. It will be run over two miles and one furlong and will be open to fillies and mares aged four and up.
“Following discussions with a number of owners and trainers with regards to possible races to be added to the Festival, the primary feedback very much supported a mares-only contest,” Simon Claisse, South west regional head of racing for Jockey Club Racecourses, said on Thursday.
“With the great success of the OLBG Mares’ Hurdle, which was promoted to Grade One for this year’s renewal, and the recent promotion of the mares’ National Hunt Flat race at Aintree to Grade Two status in 2016, it was concluded that the introduction of a mares’ novice hurdle at next year’s Festival was appropriate. We are very grateful to the British Horseracing Authority for having allowed the Trull House Stud Mares’ Novice Hurdle to start out with Grade Two status.”
Sanus Per Aquam, the favourite for next year’s 2,000 Guineas before his third start in the Group Three Tyros Stakes at Leopardstown on Thursday evening, surrendered his unbeaten record to Deauville after a battle down the home straight with Aidan O’Brien’s colt, who is now a leading ante-post contender for the Newmarket Classic next May.
Sanus Per Aquam had won his two previous races and was sent off at 1-3 to make a successful step up to Pattern company. He travelled well in second place behind his pacemaker Gleine until the turn for home, and Kevin Manning kicked on at the top of the straight with a length advantage over Deauville and Joseph O’Brien.
The favourite could not extend his lead, however, and Deauville wore him down steadily in the final furlong to win by half a length. The pair were four-and-a-half lengths clear of Lieutenant General in third.
Bookmakers reacted by promoting Deauville to the head of the market for the 2016 2,000 Guineas at a top price of 16-1, while Sanus Per Aquam drifted to 20-1.
There was also a possible pointer towards next year’s Classics in the preceding Silver Flash Stakes, a Group Three contest, as Tanaza, from Dermot Weld’s stable, beat the O’Brien-trained favourite Alice Springs by a length and a quarter.
The winner is now expected to step up to Group One company in the Moyglare Stud Stakes at The Curragh in September.
