Godolphin back in the big time
GOOD times at Godolphin — and how often have we been able to say that over the past few years?
For longer than he cares to remember, Sheikh Mohammed has looked on in envy as ‘the lads’ at Coolmore and Aidan O’Brien have hoovered up Flat racing’s most-coveted prizes.
But perhaps we will look back at Royal Ascot 2017 as the week Godolphin launched the fightback.
Ribchester started the ball rolling in the first race, the Queen Anne Stakes, and little more than an hour later, Barney Roy doubled Godolphin’s Group 1 tally by landing the St James’s Palace.
Success for Sound And Silence (Windsor Castle Stakes), Benbatl (Hampton Court Stakes) and Atty Persse (King George V Handicap) took the operation’s tally to five after three days.
And, while Coolmore pocketed yesterday’s Group 1s with Caravaggio and Winter, the Sheikh will view his return from the fixture’s first four days with great satisfaction, especially after Rare Rhythm captured yesterday’s finale, the Duke Of Edinburgh.
Joe Osborne, confirmed as John Ferguson’s successor in the role of Godolphin chief executive on Thursday, looks to have come into the job at the right time.
But one of Sheikh Mohammed’s favourite aphorisms is that, in life, there is no winning post — so this is no time to rest on laurels.
If I were Osborne, my first task would be to persuade the boss to bring Coolmore stallions back into the fold. Galileo sires a Group 1 winner every time he gets out of bed. What’s to be gained by the boycott? Racing, like any sport, thrives on competition so it’s in our interests Godolphin’s success of this week is not a flash in the pan.
GOOD luck working out the draw in the Wokingham today.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, the stands’ side was the place to be, then, as the week has worn on, the centre and the far rail have seemed to confer an advantage.
Mark Johnston doesn’t know how the ‘apparent draw bias’ was ‘reversed overnight’, and I’m just as confused as Braveheart.
Edward Lewis, in stall seven, carries the Newsboy cash. Fingers crossed.