Aussies plan counter attack
GONE: THE MELBOURNE CUP WENT ABROAD BUT REDZEL, WINX MAY BE ASCOT BOUND
Winx is still No 2 in the world with Enable fifth but the world’s top racehorse rankings look set to change next month.
They say that revenge is a dish best served cold, but when it comes to being whitewashed by the Brits (okay, I’m stretching things by including the Irish), be it cricket, rugby or on the racetrack, then the Aussies cannot wait to kick the butt of the Poms.
Still hurting from that Melbourne Cup debacle, a post-mortem which will doubtless continue to rage until the first Tuesday in November NEXT year, the Australian racing fraternity are already planning their counterattack.
And not even an Aussie victory over England in the Test with the oval ball at Twickenham next Saturday would be sufficient to erase that memory of nine of the first 11 home in the Cup being trained in Europe.
That Cup legend Bart Cummings, who died two years ago, will have been turning in his grave at the embarrassment, but at Flemington last Saturday the first seeds of revenge popped up when Redzel confirmed his status as the best sprinter in Oz with a resounding success in the Group 1 Darley Classic and promptly had his owners talking about slaying the Brits at Royal Ascot next summer.
Peter Snowden, who trains Redzel for the enthusiastic Triple Crown syndicate, said: “That is his sixth win in a row – he never really got the credit he deserved for landing the Everest in Sydney (the richest turf race in the world), but maybe now people will accept that he is the best sprinter around.
“Redzel is so professional and keeps getting the job done. The boys have enjoyed two magical days and now they all want to go to Royal Ascot and do a Black Caviar (2012) by winning the Diamond Jubilee next June.”
With Winx, the best racehorse in the Southern Hemisphere and seen by many as the No 1 on the planet, also a possible for Ascot, with Newbury’s Lockinge Stakes in May the likely stepping stone to the Queen Anne at the Royal meeting, Waltzing Matilda might have to be added to the traditional post-racing sing-song around the bandstand in the main enclosure next year.
Justifiably, the Aussies are furious that Winx, the three-time Cox Plate-winning queen of Australian racing, is still only rated second-best horse on the globe in the Longines-sponsored rankings, despite emulating the legendary Kingston Town when extending her winning spree to 22 in their most prestigious race.
Surely, either Winx or European champion Enable, who clocked up her fifth Group 1 win of 2017 when annihilating her elders in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe at Chantilly last month, should be No 1. Enable is not even No 3 – five would you believe?
Remarkably, however, that coveted honour still goes to America’s one-time wonder horse Arrogate, whose rating of 134 in winning the Dubai World Cup at Meydan last March remains the official handicappers’ best performance of the year.
The fact that Arrogate has bellyflopped in every race since Dubai, including being beaten 6.50 lengths by Gun Runner (only fourth on the list) in the Breeders’ Cup Classic in San Diego this month, matters not one iota.
The world’s best racehorse list is determined by an individual’s peak performance throughout the calendar year and not until the handicappers all get around the table in Hong Kong next month to decide on the final overall standings for 2017 will Arrogate be knocked off his perch.
Crazy? You bet it is. Maybe the powers-that-be at Longines should take a leaf out of tennis. The ATP rankings are updated weekly not annually.
Longines will again be centre stage in racing eyes next week, when the selected runners for their Hong Kong international extravaganza at Sha Tin on 10 December are announced.
More than HK$84.5 million is up for grabs for the four Group 1 races, with Coolmore’s globetrotting superstar Highland Reel possibly running his last race in the Vase before he takes up stud duties.
Highland Reel, a Breeders’ Cup Turf hero in Santa Anita last year, did not take his A-game to Del Mar, but has twice shown his liking for Sha Tin, winning the Vase in 2015 and finishing runner-up 12 months ago.
French-trained Talismanic, who denied Highland Reel backto-back Breeders’ Cup success this year, is also in line for Hong Kong, while America’s Arlington Million winner Beach Patrol, second to Andre Fabre’s horse in San Diego, is also a possible.
Coolmore could also have a big player in the Mile at Sha Tin in Lancaster Bomber, who has yet to win in 2017 but produced his best run yet when he finally got some fast ground at Del Mar. He ought to find Sha Tin underfoot conditions very similar.
Peter Miller, who trains on the track at Del Mar, celebrated a never-to-be-forgotten two winners at the Breeders’ Cup, but while his Dirt Sprint winner Roy H was once a top turf horse and is entered in Hong Kong, Miller favours taking his shock 30-1 winner Turf Sprint winner Stormy Liberal instead.
Back in Britain, where the Flat turf season closed last weekend, the jumps season proper engages top gear at Cheltenham on Saturday but those of us who take the view that thoroughbreds are bred for speed so therefore prefer the Flat are not forgotten with an excellent Polytrack card at Lingfield.
They stage two Listed AllWeather Fast Track Qualifiers and I like Godolphin’s BOYNTON in the Churchill Stakes and MAGICAL MEMORY in the Golden Rose Stakes
Boynton was beaten by Victory Bond on his only try on this surface at Chelsmford, but he had been off the track for more than two months and probably needed the race.
He’s American-bred so ought to relish it and having since run well at Newmarket where the ground was too soft, he can take his revenge on Victory Bond.
Magical Memory drops down to Listed grade for only the second time in 13 races – he won the solitary exception – and, though he is untried on Polytrack, he works on it every morning at home so is worth chancing with champion jockey Sylvester de Sousa aboard.