Newmarket Saturday

Native Trail’s Dewhurst Stakes (Group 1)

CONNECTIONS of City Of Troy rolled out the red carpet for a colt hailed “the best two-year-old we’ve trained” by Aidan O’Brien, and “Our Frankel” by part-owner Michael Tabor after his sparkling performance in winning the Group 1 Dewhurst Stakes at Newmarket on Saturday.

O’Brien was in two minds about running the son of Justify due to concerns about soft ground - he missed the National Stakes last month due to the yielding surface - but he needn’t have worried, with the course riding faster than expected and the going assessed as on the better side of good to soft by Timeform.

Ridden by Ryan Moore, the Superlative Stakes hero was sent off at the prohibitive odds of 8/15 and never looked in much trouble as he made all the running to score by three and a half lengths ahead of Alyanaabi (Owen Burrows/Jim Crowley) with Eben Shaddad (John and Thady Gosden/Benoit De La Sayette) third, a further length away.

City Of Troy set just a fair pace but showed a top-class change of gear when asked to win the race at the quarter-mile pole by Moore, and he covered that final two furlongs in 23.19 seconds against a par for conditions of 24.24 seconds (with thanks to Simon Rowlands, late of this parish, for the data).

City Of Troy’s performance was impressive on both the eye and the clock, although how impressive relies on a better understanding of time than has been provided in some quarters.

Comparisons with Frankel are inevitable, but blunt time comparisons with Frankel’s Dewhurst are facile and misleading, with similar official going descriptions for both races obscuring as much as enlightening.

What is most impressive about City Of Troy is that he was producing this sort of performance after a break since July and on just his third lifetime start.

He appears to have plenty more to offer and is rightfully the overwhelming favourite for both the Guineas and Derby next year.

There are the usual caveats to both performance and praise, however, and it behoves us all to remember Pinatubo and Air Force Blue among recent Dewhurst winners.

The former’s National Stakes romp seems to have been forgotten in the convenient rush to proclaim City Of Troy the best juvenile since Frankel.

He looked almost unassailable in the ratings prior to his defeat in the covid-delayed 2000 Guineas of 2020, while Air Force Blue garnered the same sort of praise from O’Brien as his latest Dewhurst hero before a three-year-old career of utter mediocrity.

Incredible horse

“He’s an incredible horse really and thank God we ran him,” said Aidan O’Brien after the race. “I said to everyone he was entitled to get beat on this ground, but he just never gets tired the horse – I’ve never seen a horse who doesn’t get tired.

“It’s obviously part of his make-up somewhere. We’ve never had a horse where we don’t know where the limit is. We usually push them to the limit, but we never could find his limit. We’ve never, ever, had a horse before like that.

“He is the best two-year-old we’ve trained, there’s no doubt. He’s by Justify and it’s a Justify trait – they just keep going.”

“He’s a very rare horse,” was Moore’s verdict. “For me, Frankel is the best racehorse I ever saw, and I stupidly said after this horse won the July Course, I hadn’t seen a two-year-old do that since him, but that was a silly comparison to make – this horse has a long way to go yet and he’s going to have to carry on doing what he’s done so far.”

ANCIENT Wisdom (Charlie Appleby/William Buick) may have been overshadowed on the day by what happened in the Dewhurst, but he looked a colt of huge potential himself in running out an impressive winner of the Group 3 Autumn Stakes over a mile.

The 2/1 joint favourite came from behind with a withering run which took him three and three quarter lengths clear of Chief Little Rock (Aidan O’Brien/Ryan Moore).

Ancient Wisdom had been absent since finishing third to Rosallion in the Pat Eddery Stakes when a warm favourite, but while disappointing there, subsequent events have shown that run to be better than it looked, as Charlie Appleby admitted after this redemptive effort.

He said: “We were disappointed we were beaten at Ascot, but the form worked out so well you couldn’t really be disappointed in it. He broke his maiden at Haydock, and I thought I’d take him to Newmarket thinking I’d get a bit more experience and I was probably just forcing him a bit too much.

Nice break

“After Ascot we said we’d give him a nice break and come here for either this or the Zetland, thinking he’ll be a nice middle-distance type for next year.

“There’s a lot of water to go under the bridge, but I think a mile and a quarter will be well within his compass and I personally feel he’ll appreciate going a mile and a half.

“He’s a Dubawi and I personally think you can’t force them too much in the early part of their three-year-old career. Something like the Dante might be a target for him, and whether we take in a race before, we’ll just see where we are in the spring.”

The Shunter proves his versatility

THE Shunter (Emmet Mullins/James Doyle) toughed it out in the two-and-a-quarter-mile Cesarewitch to score by three parts of length from Pied Piper (Gordon Elliott/Ryan Moore) as Irish stables dominated the big staying handicap once more.

Held up in the early stages, 14/1 chance The Shunter made sustained headway before hitting the front two furlongs out, and withheld the late thrust of the ante-post favourite to score in the silks of J.P. McManus.

“It was a brilliant performance from horse and rider,” said Mullins. “I’d say James didn’t know what to make of the instructions going out as I said the horse has probably got more ignorance than ability, but he’ll keep pulling it out and keep fighting.

“This race has probably been on the radar since he finished fourth in the November Handicap in Naas last year. We always thought there could be a big pot in him on the flat and patience has paid off.

“All options are open again. He was entered in last year’s Grand National and we scratched him at the 11th hour, but everything is an option.”

Rest Of The Card

THERE were several other blacktype contests on the Newmarket card, with Charlie Appleby enjoying an excellent day with three winners.

As well as the Autumn Stakes, the Moulton Paddocks handler took the other Group 3 events on the card, with Stonehenge Stakes winner Arabian Crown making the running and quickening clear for a five-and-a-half-length defeat of Aidan O’Brien’s Gaspar De Lemos in the Zetland Stakes, and Highland Avenue equally impressive in taking the Darley Stakes by four lengths from outsider Silver Sword.

Neither of those contests were as competitive as they ought to have been, but that won’t bother Appleby or William Buick, who was also registering a treble on the card on his way to being crowned champion jockey.