Family glory as Ayr looms for Dancing

DANCING STAR could follow illustrious relative Lochsong by trying to add the Ayr Gold Cup to Saturday’s clear-cut victory in the Qatar Stewards’ Cup.

Immediately after Glorious Goodwood success under jockey David Probert, trainer Andrew Balding (below) suggested a tilt at the Group One Champions Sprint at Ascot on October 15 was likely for a filly who has emerged through the handicap ranks to announce herself as a potential big player on the sprinting stage.

But Balding decided the biggest race run at Ayr on September 17 could also fit into her schedule.

Balding, successful with Leontes at Chester yesterday, said: ‘Short term, Dancing Star is going for a little break. It will only be a week or 10 days. She’ll certainly get an entry for the Ayr Gold Cup. She’s improving fast. She’s got better and better.’

Dancing Angel, who like Lochsong carries the colours of her ownerbreeder Jeff Smith, is the first filly to land the Stewards’ Cup since her relative in 1992.

Lochsong was four, a year older than Dancing Star, when she won the Goodwood sprint under Willie Carson. He was again on board when she won the Portland Handicap at Doncaster and when she finished the season with second to Wolfhound in Ascot’s Diadem Stakes.

In between, apprentice Francis Arrowsmith rode her to success in the Ayr Gold Cup. Lochsong went on to win three Group One sprints, including the Nunthorpe Stakes at York which was also won by her sister and Dancing Star’s grand-dam, Lochangel. Balding, who could run his impressive unbeaten two-year-old South Seas in the Solario Stakes at Sandown on August 20, is hoping Dancing Angel has inherited all her family’s talent and none of the trickier traits. Hopes of a British winner in the Group One Prix Rothschild at Deauville never looked like coming to fruition as both David O’Meara’s 2015 winner Amazing Maria and Mark Johnston’s Lumiere, along with Aidan O’Brien’s Alice Springs, proved no match for Qemah. The winner of the Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot, trained by JeanClaude Rouget and ridden Gregory Benoist, heads to next month’s Matron Stakes at Leopardstown on Irish Champions weekend. VICTORY for Chris Hayes-ridden Dream Walker in the ¤100,000 Ahonoora Handicap at Galway was the third year running Yorkshire trainer Brian Ellison has won the race. FRANKIE DETTORI grabbed Group One glory in Munich when winning the Grosser Dallmayr-Preis on Elliptique, trained by France’s Andre Fabre.