Smelling the Roses /Maxfield warms up for Kentucky Derby
Maxfield made waves in the Kentucky Derby market on Saturday with a triumphant return to action at Churchill Downs.
The Godolphin-owned colt looked a horse of serious potential in his two juvenile starts, but had been off the track since the last of those, at Keeneland in October.
The delay to 5 September for this year’s “Run for the Roses” has undoubtedly worked to his advantage and Brendan Walsh’s charge earned 50 points towards qualification in landing the $150,000 Matt Winn.
He did it in eyecatching style, too, coming home strongly under Jose Ortiz, beating Ny Traffic and Pneumatic by a length and a length and three-quarters.
Godolphin USA president Jimmy Bell told www.godolphin.com: “It was nice to see that Maxfield was able to maintain the same level of professionalism and consistency that he showed as a twoyear-old.
“Maxfield had been off since October, but I think that Brendan was quietly very confident that the horse was going to give a good account of himself. He felt that Maxfield was spot on in terms of fitness, while his mental attitude has always set him apart from day one.
“It’s great to see him back at the races and deliver a performance like that.”
Bell added: “When Jose got him to the outside and set Maxfield on his way in the straight, you could see he was moving best of all. We were able to confirm what we hoped we had, and now we can sit down and think about plans going forward.”
Maxfield is now as short as 6-1 for the Kentucky Derby, for which he has 60 qualifying points overall.
Meanwhile, Deacon hit the mark on his most recent outing in February and can follow up in the Prix d’aquitaine at Lyon-parilly today.
The Dansili colt was having his third start for Christopher Head on that occasion having shown some promise when previously trained by his father, Freddy.
Placed on his first couple of attempts for his new handler, Deacon seemed to relish being allowed to make all over 12 furlongs as he switched back from an extended mile and five furlongs.
He built up a decent advantage and while his rivals caught up a bit in the closing stages, Deacon still won in a comfortable manner. Head sticks to 12 furlongs here and Deacon can shine again.
Head snr can also be among the winners with Suffrage in the Prix Bruleur.
He suffered a bit of a troubled passage on his racecourse bow at Fontainebleau towards the end of last year, but he did seem to be travelling well enough at one point before folding a bit tamely in the finish.
The 11-length margin of defeat is possibly not a fair reflection of his run and ten furlongs should be within his compass.