O’Brien lands Queen Anne as Battaash shows colours
BATTAASH showed Royal Ascot his true colours when he produced a devastating display of sprinting to win the King’s Stand Stakes at the third attempt yesterday.
On a day when Royal Ascot had a bit of everything – a desperately close finish to hand Aidan O’Brien victory in the Queen Anne, a Frankie Dettori winner, a rags-to-riches outsider which failed to get a bid as a yearling beating the colt knocked down for £3.4 million – it was the brutal speed of six-year-old Battaash that topped it off.
From the moment the gates opened, Jim Crowley, who rode a first-day treble in the Sheikh Hamdan silks, was merely a passenger doing the steering, with Battaash running right on the limit of what was prudent.
But the 5/6 favourite was so much better than his rivals, had so much class, that when the jockey asked for extra a furlong out, there was still fuel in the tank and he powered through the last 200 yards to win by two-and-aquarter lengths from Equilateral, his stable companion.
Victory in the race completed the set of Europe’s major five-furlong sprints for the gelding, which had already won a Nunthorpe and a Prix de l’Abbaye.
“He was really on his ‘A’ game,” trainer Charlie Hills said. “He was relaxed beforehand and when the gates opened I could see he would take a lot of beating. He had been relaxed at home until Saturday, when he was very strong in the first half of his gallop. He was getting to the point when he needed a race.
“I’m so proud he did that. He’s been second twice and I’ve been second in it three times. He does like Ascot, after all. He’s been in the family a long time, so you slightly well up when they do that. He’s been the horse of a lifetime.”
If Battaash provided the brilliance, the Queen Anne provided the thrilling finish, between Circus Maximus and Terebellum, the first and second favourites, under Ryan Moore and Dettori respectively.
Trademark
Dettori kicked for home a furlong out and went a neck up but Circus Maximus, a miler which almost gets a mile and a half, just outstayed Dettori’s filly to get up in the final stride and win by a head.
“He’s a trademark Galileo,” trainer O’Brien said. “He has pace, he’s tough and brave. He’s probably a bit underestimated, but he’s very solid.
“He loves getting eyeballed. A mile is his trip. He’s lazy, which is why he wears the blinkers. Sometimes you can’t get him to focus over a mile and a quarter, but the pace of mile races gets his blood up.”
After being touched off in the Queen Anne, Dettori did not have to wait long for his first winner when Frankly Darling ran out the impressive winner of the Ribblesdale Stakes to take John Gosden to his half century of Royal Ascot winners.
A relatively inexperienced daughter of Frankel, and with quite a bit of her sire’s wilfulness about her, she was bursting with enthusiasm early but when, two out, Dettori had a little look and kicked, she put the race to bed in an instant.
O’Brien’s Ennistymon ran on for second to close the gap to a length and three quarters, but in the last 100 yards Dettori was already thinking ahead to his flying dismount. Frankly Darling is now second favourite for the Oaks.
William Muir and Martin Dwyer, his son-in-law, will go to Epsom the same day for the Derby with a live chance, after Pyledriver caused an 18/1 upset to beat Arthur’s Kingdom by two lengths in the King Edward VII, with the expensive O’Brien-trained favourite Mogul only fourth.
“We know he stays and has a turn of foot, but he switches off,” said Dwyer.
“Sir Percy [Dwyer’s previous Derby winner] was unbeaten at two but, though this horse won first time out, he was like Bambi on ice in the Royal Lodge.”
Muir, saddling his second Ascot winner, said: “He’s always been a long-term prospect – he was weak as a kitten last year. I came here thinking I could have two winners – I’ll settle for a first and second (Jack’s Point, at 66/1, in the first race).