Jack ticks box for Dante run
WHAT i s rapidly becoming a frantic search for the likely Epsom Derby victor early next month will focus now on Thursday’s Dante Stakes at York, which features the l atest l eading ante- post market fancy, Jack Hobbs, strutting his stuff for John Gosden’s stable.
Although considered a colt of some potential when running at Sandown, Gosden’s charge made a mockery of his handicap mark of 85 on his second start and the principal betting firms were only too happy to latch on to this horse to fill the void on their books left by a series of defeats for better-touted sorts.
Jack Hobbs is due to come up against both seasonal debutant Elm Park, the fluent Racing Post trophy winner last October, and Ballydoyle’s John F Kennedy, which let his connections and admirers down badly in the mud at Leopardstown last month, in a Dante Stakes that often sorts out the men from the boys on the Knavesmire.
Although successful last week in Derby trials along with Ryan Moore, courtesy of Hans Holbein in Chester and again at Lingfield last Saturday with Kilimanjaro, Aidan O’Brien is running out of time ahead of Epsom with some of his better-known colts, so the onus is on John F Kennedy to step up to the mark here.
Last of three with Moore up on his first start as a three-year-old in last month’s Ballysax Stakes, at least John F Kennedy had the form of that below-par display boosted when the r unner- up Zafilani romped home at Gowran Park and, more importantly, surprise scorer Success Days made a stunning r eturn t o Leopardstown on Sunday.
Almost sure to be supplemented either for Epsom or the Irish Derby at his home Curragh track, Success Days, which Ken Condon trains for Malaysian business tycoon Robert Ng, is in his element in testing conditions and was completing a frontrunning treble at the Dublin course in Shane Foley’s hands.
The emergence of Success Days, which would require an outlay of £75,000 to be added to the Epsom field, as a genuine Derby hope is an important development in the careers of Condon and Foley as this potent combination seldom get to dine at the top table in a discipline usually dominated by a relative few.
However, their strike-rate in the current campaign is indeed admirable and they warmed up for Sunday’s rout of the Derrinstown Stud promotion’s three rivals with the grey son of now-deceased Jeremy by plundering a Listed race at Nottingham the previous afternoon with 7/1 chance Newsletter.
Full marks for enterprise the same afternoon also are due to Condon’s Curragh colleague Tracey Collins, as she scooped Group Three honours at Lingfield with William Buick’s 16/ 1 mount Majestic Queen.