Buick breaks into international elite with three wins at Breeders’ Cup
Charlie Appleby and William Buick crowned a golden season for Godolphin by combining for three winners at the 38th Breeders’ Cup, a meeting which is pound-for-pound the best in the world, in Southern California over the weekend.
Despite the chaotic start of Friday’s Juvenile Turf, when their Modern Games was scratched and then reinstated before winning, this Breeders’ Cup was one of the finest editions.
That is partly due to the quality of the horses but also because the configuration of the course, tight bends and the short “stretch”, is conducive to thrilling climaxes, with horses invariably flying at the finish.
It is not easy to ride but this was, in some ways, a coming of age for Buick, 33, who hitherto had not cracked the United States in the way that Ryan Moore and Frankie Dettori have. If the jockey was not already world class, this elevated him into that bracket, as at home at
Doncaster as he is Del Mar, a track at which even Dettori has not ridden a Breeders’ Cup winner.
In the Mile, Buick had Space Blues perfectly positioned just behind the pace the whole way before taking it up inside the final furlong to win by a half a length. But it was his ride on Yibir in the $4 million Turf that stood out. At the back of the field the gelding pulled hard for three parts of a mile but, after swinging wide into the straight, his long, raking stride ate up the ground impressively to pass Broome and Dettori late on, sending Aidan O’brien home with a rare blank.
In the spring Yibir was held in the same regard at home as Adayar and Hurricane Lane, but he was not doing it on the track so he was gelded. On Saturday’s evidence, he would give either of his Classic-winning chums a run for their money. “He dropped himself out at Belmont but here he broke well and pulled hard,” said Buick. “I thought he was doing too much. Halfway round the last bend I could see Broome had gone but I was always confident, nothing picks up like he does.”
Appleby took six horses, contested three races, won three races and had two scratched at the start. “I can take a couple of them home fresh,” joked the trainer, whose Breeders’ Cup record now stands at six winners from 11 runners.
Another theme was the Japanese, who had never had a winner at the meeting until Loves Only You won the Filly And Mare Turf. Within two hours they had doubled their tally with Marche Lorraine, a 50-1 shot in the Distaff, ridden by Oisin Murphy.