Arc star Treve is the hottest show in town
IF FRENCH actress Virginie Ledoyen struggled to grab a sliver of the limelight while starring alongside Leonardo DiCaprio, she’ll have a good idea of what to expect at Longchamp on Sunday. Ledoyen (below), DiCaprio’s girlfriend in 2000 film
The Beach, is ambassador for the Qatar Prix de L’Arc de Triomphe — a role previously played by fellow actress Juliette Binoche and 2013 Wimbledon champion Marion Bartoli. But at this year’s Arc, there is no doubt who tops the bill: Treve. Victory for the five-year-old mare, who has won Europe’s premier all-age, middledistance race for the last two years, will make history. Seven horses have won the €5million contest twice since it was first run in 1920, but no horse has ever tried to win it three times. This unique challenge has sparked Trevemania among the French public, most of whom usually treat horse-racing with a Gallic shrug of indifference. A song has been recorded in her honour and a film produced of her galloping while superimposed on famous Paris landmarks. She has a Twitter account, and sports programmes that usually ignore horse racing have been seeking interviews with her trainer Criquette Head-Maarek. All of which would suggest a problem in matching expectations at HeadMaarek’s Chantilly stable, north of Paris. Don’t believe it. Twenty-four hours ahead of the big day, almost 100 Britishbased racing fans will visit the stable and the trainer has vowed to parade Treve, who was bred at the Head family stud in Normandy. ‘How can I say no to some and not others?’ says HeadMaarek, 66, the only woman to train an Arc winner and who also won in 1979 with Three Troikas. ‘The other day I saw two ladies. They had come from Brittany. They asked if they could feed her carrots. She loves it, although she only likes tiny, thin carrots. She is very good-natured and likes people. She likes to be surrounded by them.’
Head-Maarek, whose school days were spent in Guildford and Eastbourne, can bring both racing and personal perspective to the big day. Combined with father Alec and grandfather William, her family have won nine Arcs, and Criquette had a brain tumour removed in 1990. She is not afraid to make tough calls, last year removing Frankie Dettori as Treve’s jockey and replacing him with Thierry Jarnet, whose style she thought suited Treve better. On Sunday, Dettori — on board John Gosden’s Derby winner Golden Horn, who is expected to be added to the race today at a cost of €120,000 — will be a major threat, but the signs are positive. The ailments which hindered Treve last year and prompted her to start the 2014 Arc at odds of 11-1 are behind her. She has won her three races this season and there is already talk of racing on next year. ‘I am not going to say she’s unbeatable but she is the best I have ever trained,’ says Head-Maarek. ‘If she wins three Arcs, she will be the greatest race mare ever.’