DUBAI West Coast leads eclectic cast

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – The late-blooming gelding is trained by an Indian expatriate for Chechnya’s strongman leader.

The 6-year-old mare in her career finale has a Canadian diamond-prospector owner and a New Orleans trainer introducing the word “bro” into the United Arab Emirates lexicon.

There’s the philosophy professor turned short-term loan mogul, and a trainer twice kidnapped by Venezuelan bandits.

And that’s just the supporting cast. The main characters are a man in a white dishdasha, who is the ruler of Dubai, and a dude in white hair, the ruler of Southern California racing.

An ill-conceived Hollywood script? No, this is the actual cast assembled for the Dubai World Cup, and if the race itself Saturday night at Meydan has half the grist of the humans behind the horses, this movie, which checks in at a very watchable two minutes, should be a hit.

Ten are entered in the 23rd World Cup, a $10 million Group 1 contested over 2,000 meters, about 1 1/4 miles. Post time for the race, the last of nine Group 1 or Group 2 stakes worth a total of $30 million on the card, is 12:50 p.m. Eastern. Live video and betting on the card, which starts at 7:45 a.m., is available at DRF Bets.

Rain tried to spoil last year’s party and failed when the Bob Baffert-trained Arrogate beat Gun Runner in an epic performance. This year it’s hot and dry, but once again Baffert, ubiquitous this week with the trademark white hair and sunglasses, has the horse to beat. Nothing new there. Baffert has started horses in only six World Cups and Arrogate was his third winner. West Coast is no Arrogate, but doesn’t have to be to make Baffert 4 for 7.

Any of West Coast’s last four performances – wins in the Travers Stakes and the Pennsylvania Derby, a third in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, a second in the Pegasus World Cup – would do the trick Saturday night.

“I don’t want to jinx him, but he’s doing better for this race than those other races,” Baffert said.

Javier Castellano, looking for his first World Cup win, rides West Coast for owners Gary and Mary West. A 4-year-old by Flatter, West Coast is a brute of a colt who emerged midway through last season as the best in his class, combining useful tactical speed with stamina.

If West Coast breaks well from post 9, he should settle into rhythm pressing or stalking the pace.

The only horse drawn outside West Coast is Thunder Snow, one of two in the race for Godolphin, whose prime mover is Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum. Thunder Snow has decent credentials but the more interesting Godolphin horse is Talismanic.

Based in France with trainer Andre Fabre, Talismanic won the 2017 Breeders’ Cup Turf and is one of the better 1 1/2-mile turf horses in the world. Fabre believes 1 1/4 miles will suit Talismanic, but there are other questions, particularly concerning dirt, over which Talismanic never has raced.

“I don’t know how it’s going to work,” Fabre said. “The mile and a quarter on that surface, you need some stamina, and he has a good cruising speed. It’s going to be a fast [pace], and he’s not used to that.”

North America looks like the speed from post 2 under Richard Mullen, and when he went to the lead March 10 in the Maktoum Challenge, his first dirt race at 1 1/4 miles, he didn’t stop, winning by five lengths over Thunder Snow. A strong inside speed bias ruled that night, but North America, trained by Sateesh Seemar for Ramzan Kadyrov, head of the Chechen Republic, could be the now horse.

“Our horse is that good,” said Seemar.

A win by Furia Cruzada or Forever Unbridled (both get a five-pound weight break) would be the first in the World Cup for a filly or mare. Furia Cruzada’s chances are roughly nil, but Forever Unbridled, who makes her final start, was champion dirt female in America last year. She has looked better during morning training day by day this week, but is a closer who needs a fair-playing surface.

“She’s done so well since we got here,” said Dallas Stewart, who trains Forever Unbridled for geologist and diamond prospector Chuck Fipke. “We’re ready.”

Gunnevera, another American closer, might not be ready. The distant third-place finisher behind Gun Runner and West Coast in the Pegasus, he bruised a hoof Wednesday and had his shoes pulled to relieve discomfort. Trainer Antonio Sano, twice abducted in his native Venezuela, said Thursday morning that Gunnevera’s hoof had improved. Earlier in the week, Sano described Gunnevera as a different horse since a procedure to fix an undescended testicle.

“His works in Florida were crazy-good,” Sano said. “He’s a better horse right now, but I know this track’s not easy for him – it’s for horses in front.”

Paul Reddam, head of the loan company Cash Call, owns Pavel, a talented 4-year-old who has endured troubled trips his last two starts. Pavel doesn’t appear to be in West Coast’s class, and probably rates below Baffert’s second runner, Mubtaahij, who was second in the 2016 World Cup and fourth last year while based in Dubai with trainer Mike de Kock.

A win from the 10th entrant, the Japanese 8-year-old Awardee, would come as a shock.

Another win for the guy with the shock of white hair would not.