LARC Prix Maurice de Gheest (Group 1)

IT never rains, but it pours. Just ask Ed Arkell, Goodwood’s Clerk Of The Course.

Conversely, when things are going your way, you tend to get the rub of the green.

So it was at Deauville last Sunday, when the French training fraternity, bidding to maintain the fantastic recent record of having kept nine of the first 11 domestic Group 1 prizes of 2023 away from the clutches of overseas raiders, were represented by just three members of a 10-runner line-up for the Group 1 LARC Prix Maurice de Gheest.

One member of that trio, the Nicolas Caullery-trained Fort Payne, finished tailed off last and another, Egot, was a well beaten last-but-one.

So it was all left to Fort Payne’s stablemate, King Gold, to set off in pursuit of Karl Burke’s Spycatcher, who had taken over in front when the front-running Art Power cried enough with two of the contest’s six and a half furlongs left to run.

A first Group 1 scorer for the Haras de la Haie Neuve stallion Anodin, King Gold looked likely to win with a little in hand when drawing alongside the leader with 100 yards to run. But Spycatcher proved so resolute that there was nothing to separate the pair at the finish.

Surprising

Even regulars at the track were unable to choose between the two having seen the television freeze-frame on the line, so it was a little surprising when the official verdict was a short head rather than the minimum distance of a nose.

The Archie Watston-trained Saint Lawrence and Hollie Doyle were only a neck adrift in third with a further two lengths back to the Burke second string, Cold Case, in fourth.

Despite the narrowness of the margin, even Spycatcher’s most ardent supporter would need to have been stone-hearted to have begrudged what was an exceedingly popular local victory.

Caullery (below) is one of the biggest characters in French racing and his passion for the sport has led to him fronting his own rock band, called Elektrik Monday, to provide musical entertainment on various racecourses and help pull in the crowds.

He looks the part too - his flowing locks and cool sunglasses are reminiscent of Jon Bon Jovi.

Which is not to suggest that he is anything other than a serious trainer. His 12 years with a licence in Chantilly have been something of a slow burn, the fire only beginning to establish itself when Golden Wood landed the same valuable Meydan handicap in both 2017 and 2018, and a first pattern success proved elusive until Fort Payne lifted the Group 3 Prix du Palais Royal little more than two months ago.

King Gold’s victory produced emotional winner’s enclosure scenes for a second reason – it was a first top level triumph for owner-breeders Raymonde and Christian Wingtans following four decades of toil.

They live at Haras des Forets at Saint-Hymer, barely five miles outside Deauville, and have been involved in this particular thoroughbred family for four generations.

A six-year-old gelding, King Gold seems to have really benefitted from a winter trip to Dubai and is clearly thriving on his racing: this was his eighth start of the year.

KING Gold’s hectic 2023 campaign is surpassed by that of the Archie Watson-trained Brave Emperor, who landed Sunday’s main supporting race, the Group 3 Prix Daphnis over a round mile, despite being shouldered with a 3lb penalty for a prior success in this grade.

A gelded son of Sioux Nation and bred in Ireland by Caroline Hanly and Sean Ronan, Brave Emperor has been clocking up the miles on Europe’s road and ferry network and has yet to let owners Middleham Park Racing down on any of his foreign forays, winning at Cagnes-Sur-Mer in February and Krefeld in April as well as finishing third in a valuable Group 3 in Sweden.

This time, under an aggressive Luke Morris ride, he proved three quarters of a length too strong for Sosino with the promising favourite, Colombier, who had trouble securing a clear passage early in the home straight, just a neck back in third.

The rest of the day’s stakes action belonged to Jimmy Murphy’s Redpender Stud in Co Kilkenny as Asymmetric and Millstream, the first two foals of Murphy’s Helvellyn mare Swirral Edge, landed the two listed races that kicked off the card.

Asymmetric, a son of Showcasing, has enjoyed a cosmopolitan existence thus far, winning a Group 2 and finishing third in the Group 1 Prix Morny as a juvenile for Alan King, then racing in America for Wesley Ward at three before recrossing the Atlantic to join the Chantilly yard of the expatriate Italian Maurizio Guarnieri.

He took the five-furlong Prix du Cercle by three-quarters of a length on his first start since December while fellow Redpender graduate Millstream, a three-year-old Gleneagles colt who has been coming up just short in top British handicaps of late for trainer Jane Chapple-Hyam, beat Burke’s Secret Angel by three and a half lengths in the six-furlong Prix Moonlight Cloud.