Appleby seeks first French Derby win with Modern Games

Charlie Appleby, private trainer for Godolphin, over the last several years has won nearly every major race in Europe, and on Sunday at Chantilly he sends out likely favorite Modern Games trying to win his first Prix du Jockey Club.

The Prix du Jockey Club, France’s derby, is run right-handed over 1 5/16 miles. This year’s renewal (post time 10 a.m. Eastern, wagering at DRFBets.com) drew a field of 15. The Chantilly course on Friday was rated good.

While Appleby has yet to win the race, Godolphin has a French Derby winner, with the Saeed bin Suroor-trained Shamardal in 2005. Modern Games is well known to American racing fans, having been at the center of the unfortunate incident in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf wherein the colt mistakenly was scratched behind the starting gate. Eventually reinstated into the race, Modern Games ran for purse money only, an embarrassing situation made all the worse when he stormed home an easy winner over Tiz the Bomb.

Modern Games then went on winter holiday, returning with a workmanlike victory May 3 at Longchamp in the Poule d’Essai des Poulains, France’s 2000 Guineas. That one-mile race was as far as Modern Games has yet run, and Sunday’s longer contest might push his distance limits.

:: Get free PPs for racing at Chantilly

While Appleby never has won this race, trainer Jean-Claude Rouget has four French Derbies, including three of the last six. Rouget has four chances Sunday, with Al Hakeem and to a lesser extent Vadeni his major hopes.

Al Hakeem looks as likely a win candidate, in fact, as Modern Games, though he has not approached the early favorite’s level of accomplishment. Al Hakeem, by Siyouni, finished fourth in his debut last October but since has won three in a row. This year, Al Hakeem scored a sharp front-running all-weather win at Chantilly before Rouget gave him a run over the Chantilly turf in a listed 1 1/4-mile race May 3. Taken back off the pace this time by jockey Mirco Demuro, Al Hakeem was slow to settle but eventually relaxed before a sustained run from midpack carried him to a four-length win over Yoozuna, who also contests the Jockey Club.

Vadeni, an Aga Khan homebred, won the Group 3 Prix de Guiche over nine furlongs May 10 at Chantilly, though the horse that was second by 2 1/2 lengths, Machete, might not be as good as the colt Al Hakeem beat by a wider margin.

El Bodegon was rated among France’s top 2-year-olds of 2021, capping his campaign with a 1 1/2-length win in the Group 1 Criterium de Saint-Cloud over Stone Age, who went into Saturday a leading contender for the Derby at Epsom. El Bodegon, however, ran disturbingly flat in his lone start at age 3, never coming close to contention and finishing seventh of eight in the Dante Stakes on May 13 at York Racecourse in England.

Aidan O’Brien, who won his first Prix du Jockey Club last year, has two runners Sunday, with Ivy League, the mount of Ryan Moore, appearing to hold an edge on The Acropolis.