ST LEGER BID IS LOOKING MUIR LIKELY
PYLEDRIVER will seek Classic glory in the Pertemps St Leger — in preference to a challenge for the Grand Prix de Paris.
Trainer William Muir has been weighing up the two races since his stable star’s emphatic victory in the Group 2 Sky Bet Great Voltigeur Stakes at York nine days ago.
But coronavirus quarantine rules have persuaded Pyledriver’s owners, Guy and Huw Leach and Roger Devlin, to send their colt to Doncaster on September 12.
Muir (above) said yesterday: “The way Covid-19 is in France, and we have to isolate, is going to make life very difficult.
“The boys have said to me, ‘Let’s head to the Leger. We got the horse for fun. We won’t be able to go to France because we’ll have to quarantine and we can’t be running our businesses’.
“They like the fun of going to the races and enjoying it, so why not have a go at Doncaster?”
Royal Ascot’s King Edward VII Stakes hero, hampered when returning 11th to Serpentine in the Derby at Epsom, has to prove his stamina over the St Leger’s one mile, six furlong and 115 yards. But Muir added of the son of Harbour Watch, a general 7-2 chance for the final Classic: “Would he have got beaten with two more furlongs to run the other day?
“Probably not — and any of those horses from the other day are going to be 3lb worse off because we’re not going to have a penalty.
“The owners are quite comfortable because the worst thing that happens is that he doesn’t stay.
“We know we’ve got a nice horse — we simply don’t know if he will last the trip. If he does stay, we’ve got a different angle for next year as well.”