Prince Khalid Abdullah has a clear lead in the owners’ table after the Derby success of Workforce and the Saudi patron has bright prospects of advancing those gains at Royal Ascot next week.
Abdullah has fancied runners in four of the seven championship races — notably Manifest and Showcasing, who head advance betting for the Gold Cup and Golden Jubilee Stakes respectively. André Fabre is likely to send Byword over from France to join Twice Over in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes, while Zacinto adds depth to what promises to be a vintage renewal of the Queen Anne Stakes.
The back-up team is also strong. Principal Role is earmarked for the Ribblesdale Stakes, Redwood holds the Hardwicke Stakes entry while Timepiece, who finished unplaced in the Investec Oaks, is likely to drop back to a mile for the Sandringham Stakes. However, Special Duty, the dual classic winner, is expected to bypass the Coronation Stakes in favour of the Falmouth Stakes at Newmarket next month.
Zacinto faces a daunting assignment in the opening race of the five-day meeting when he confronts Goldikova, Rip Van Winkle and Paco Boy over the straight mile. The four-year-old chased home Rip Van Winkle in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes at Ascot in September but has since run disappointingly in the Breeders’ Cup Mile and the Lockinge Stakes won by Paco Boy last month.Nevertheless, connections believe Zacinto deserves his place in Queen Anne field. “He was not quite right after his Breeders’ Cup run and he was in an uncharacteristically bad frame of mind before the Lockinge,” Lord Grimthorpe, racing manager for Abdullah, said yesterday.
“He has since behaved much better at home, and the Queen Anne Stakes would obviously be a good race to win.”
Manifest and Showcasing approach their respective races on the back of encouraging runs last time. “Manifest is relatively untried for his age,” Grimthorpe said of the four-year-old. “As with most horses going for the Gold Cup, we don’t know whether he will stay two-and-a-half miles but the further he goes, the better he looks.”
Showcasing, for his part, finished strongly when conceding weight in the Duke Of York Stakes last month. “He started slightly slowly at York but he rallied well from that,” Grimthorpe said. “We were very pleased with the way he came home.”
Byword is a fascinating candidate for the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes on Wednesday. The winner of four of his seven races, he beat all bar Goldikova in the nine-furlong Prix d’Ispahan last month, when he drew ten lengths clear of the third, German Derby winner Wiener Walzer. “It was a good effort from Byword and the extra furlong at Ascot will suit him,” Grimthorpe said.
Workforce lost just 9lb in winning the Derby but connections feel that the colt must have given his all to shatter the track record. Grimthorpe said: “It was always the plan to go on to the Irish Derby, but we weren’t quite expecting to see what we saw from him at Epsom.
“He must have had a hard race, so Ireland [on June 27] might come too soon. At this stage it is more likely he will go straight to the King George, but all options remain open. We will know a lot more in a week’s time. He didn’t lose that much weight, so on the face of it, he has taken the Derby well.”
Meanwhile, Aviate, much fancied for the Oaks before finishing seventh, is to be given a short break after the daughter of Dansili failed to stay. But Abdullah, who has won three classics this season, has another live hope in Deluxe, who contests the Prix de Diane [French Oaks] on Sunday.
Source:The Times
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