It’s fun time during Breakfast With Stars
O’Brien’s runners check out main track, Godolphin team field queries with aplomb
Besides the main event tomorrow, the most popular event on the schedule this week drew in a huge crowd of happy people who were either taking a sneaky hour off work or bringing their children a little late for school in order to spend some time sitting in the glorious surrounds of the Meydan Racecourse and grandstand. There was plenty to do and see while enjoying a sumptuous buffet breakfast and several adults and children tried sitting on the Equicizer [mechanical horse] to test their skills at riding like a jockey.
Legendary Irish flat trainer, Aidan O’Brien sent his sevenhorse team to the main track where they trotted one circuit before turning around and cantering a second one, all in the military style formation we have become accustomed to seeing whenever they travel outside of Ireland’s green lands. Mendelssohn [Derby] made sure we all knew he had arrived, shouting out his announcement several times while Idaho [Sheema Classic] dripped profusely with sweat in the same manner as his brother, Highland Reel. This family trait doesn’t stop them preforming at the highest level. Lancaster Bomber [Dubai Turf] wowed me with his stature and regal composure.
Dubai’s Godolphin team gave very generously of their time yesterday, giving many interviews to the world’s media and signing autographs. Both Godolphin’s trainers, Saeed Bin Surour and Charlie Appleby, were present for the obligatory press conference, with Appleby nominating Blue Point [Al Quoz] as his best chance of a winner, a fact jockey William Buick readily agreed with.
Big chance
Bin Surour, when asked to talk of his previous seven World Cup Winners, humbly declined to discuss them further saying, “I’ve won the World Cup seven times but that is in the past … history, we have to look forward to the future now.”
He spoke of his feelings regarding stepping Gold Star up in trip for the Gold Cup. “I like him very much, I think he will stay two miles.”
Bin Surour put up Dubai Turf contestant Benbatl as having a big chance of collecting another Group 1 to add to his continually growing portfolio of winners.
Jacquie Doyle is a retired trainer and the mother of leading jockeys, James and Sophie Doyle.