In hot Pursuit of top prize at Ayr Gold Cup
All bets on sturdy gelding trained byTim Easterby
Shortly after 3.50pm on Saturday, the winner of the 2018 William Hill Ayr Gold Cup will be crowned and connections will have their photographs taken and plastered over Sunday’s newspapers.
And I believe the prominent colours in these pictures will be the yellow and white of the Ontoawinner Syndicate who own the five year gelding Flying Pursuit, trained by Tim Easterby.
With the forecast suggesting the race will be run on soft ground, conditions couldn’t be better for this horse who ran second to Donjuan Triumphant in the nursery handicap at this meeting in 2015 and then won the Tennent’s Handicap at the track last June.
Flying Pursuit came to my attention when winning the Sky Bet Dash over six furlongs at York in July on soft ground and ran well enough to finish sixth in the Great St Wilfrid at Ripon last month.
He was behind another Ayr Gold Cup hopeful, Growl, that afternoon who finished two lengths ahead of him in third but the going was a lot faster that day than it will be on Saturday and for me that swings the pendulum firmly in the Easterby horse’s favour.
There could be another twist in the tale as his likely rider will be Rachel Richardson and no lady jockey has ever won the race. Rachel is more than capable and if given the nod won’t let anyone down.
So I’m going for Flying Pursuit to land Gold with the Richard Fahey trained pair Growl and George Bowen certainly good enough to run into place along with Dean Ivory’s Eirene.
It’s not just about the Gold Cup, though, as over the three days there is more than £750,000 on offer in prizemoney and that will guarantee some fantastic racing.
Thursday’s feature, the William Hill Doonside Cup, sees the Saeed bin Suroor-trained Dubai Horizon, a winner at Ayr in July and then at Sandown in August, attempt to become the sixth Godolphin horse to win this race.
On Friday there are two listed races – the Shadwell Stud/EBF Stallions Harry Rosebery Stakes where Danny Tudhope is set to ride Secret Venture for Kevin Ryan, and the Al Maktoum Cup Arran Scottish Fillies Stakes with Fahey’s Darkana an interesting runner.
Scotland’s only Group race, the William Hill Firth of Clyde Stakes, has attracted high class entries including Queen Jo Jo, second in the Group 2 Lowther Stakes at York.