ENABLE’S GOOD TO GO
JOHN GOSDEN was purring as Enable tuned up for her Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe history bid with a Newmarket workout yesterday.
But the Clarehaven trainer warned the five-year-old mare must produce a personal best if she is to become the first horse to capture Europe’s middledistance championship for a third time at Longchamp on Sunday week.
Frankie Dettori was on hand to partner Enable in exercise with stablemate Crossed Baton on the Rowley Mile track yesterday.
And, after watching his stable star nose ahead, Gosden said: “I was very pleased. She worked just how we wanted and she seems very happy.
“She just got the measure of her lead horse and she’s clever now – ‘I’m not going to rush off and be an exuberant young girl!’
“I wanted her to stay with her lead horse – I’m not here to see her go eight lengths clear or anything like that.”
Enable is Ladbrokes’ 4-5 favourite to take her place among racing’s immortals with an Arc hat-trick.
But Gosden is taking nothing for granted with the likes of Prix du Jockey-Club winner Sottass, Aidan O’Brien’s dual Group 1 hero Japan and Godolphin’s Ghaiyyath, back to form with a 14-length crushing of his rivals in the top-level Grosser Preis von Baden in Germany at the start of the month, among her rivals in Paris.
“It’s a race of great depth – she’d have to be in top form to win it,” he added. “You have the best three-yearolds in the form of Sottass, the best three-year-old in France, and Japan, who is looking like the best threeyear-old colt right now.
“And André Fabre tells me last year’s Arc fourth Waldgeist is training better than ever, and he will run a huge race if the ground remains in France like it is at the moment.
“Then you have Ghaiyyath. He is a mighty rival.”