Alpha Centauri targeting third straight Group 1 in Falmouth Stakes

Alpha Centauri was so brilliant wining the Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot it’s hard to imagine what she could do for an encore.

Overseas antepost bettors evidently are expecting more of the same from Alpha Centauri, who is an early odds-on favorite to win the Group 1 Falmouth Stakes on Friday at Newmarket. Alpha Centauri is one of seven entrants in the Falmouth, a straight-course mile.

Trainer Aidan O’Brien has won the race two years in a row with Roly Poly in 2017 and Alice Springs in 2016. O’Brien has Clemmie for Friday’s edition, but she and the other five in the race will either need to take a major step forward or have Alpha Centauri considerably regress to have a chance.

Based in Ireland with trainer Jessica Harrington, Alpha Centauri, a daughter of Mastercraftsman, was bred and is owned by the Niarchos family. Alpha Centauri is a mountain of a filly who needs good to firm going to show her best; she got it at Ascot last month and won the Coronation, a one-mile race around a right-handed bend, by six lengths in a performance as impressive to the eye as it looks on paper. That made consecutive Group 1 scores for Alpha Centauri, who in her previous start captured the Irish 1000 Guineas. Good to firm ground is forecast Friday at Newmarket and over that sort of going it is difficult to forecast anything other than another win for Alpha Centauri, a filly for whom the stars appear to be the limit.

The Falmouth is the fourth race on the Friday program at Newmarket with post time set for 10:35 Eastern.