Auguste Rodin bounces back, gets O'Brien ninth Derby win
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Trainer Aidan O’Brien’s sixth and eighth Derby winners, Wings of Eagles in 2017 and Serpentine in 2020, came with horses nearly no one expected to win. His ninth, on Saturday at Epsom Downs, came with Auguste Rodin, a horse long expected to contend in the Derby, who’d performed unexpectedly poorly finishing 12th last month in the 2000 Guineas.
Run down Newmarket’s straight mile course over soft, laboring ground, the Guineas didn’t suit Auguste Rodin at all, but the colt looked perfectly at home under Ryan Moore at 1 1/2 miles on good to firm going over Epsom’s quirky, winding, undulating course.
Moore, winning his third Derby, held Auguste Rodin up in about eighth as O’Brien’s other two entrants, Adelaide River and San Antonio, set a moderate pace as the 14-runner field went along in a relatively tight pack. Past the famed Tattenham Corner, going into the final three furlongs, the turning part of the course behind him, Moore pulled Auguste Rodin out from behind his cover and the colt began making steady ground on the leaders. Collaring favored Arrest, Auguste Rodin cruised into very serious contention with a quarter mile left, the only other horse finishing with interest the 66-1 shot King of Steel. Knifing between horses under lesser known jockey Kevin Scott, getting the jump on Auguste Rodin after saving ground, King of Steel hit the front with about a furlong and a half to run. A massive colt, King of Steel dwarfed modest-sized Auguste Rodin, who served a reminder that bigger is not necessarily better in a racehorse as he wore down King of Steel to win by a half length.
More than four lengths separated King of Steel and third place White Birch, who had 1 1/4 lengths on Sprewell in fourth. Arrest faded to 10th, well-supported Passenger was 12th, and third favorite Military Order last of 14 for Charlie Appleby and Godolphin. Winning time for the 1 1/2 miles was 2:33.88, one of the faster Derbies of the last dozen years.
Auguste Rodin, bred by Coolmore and owned by Michael Tabor, Derrick Smith, Mrs. John Magnier, and Westerberg, was the last son of the late, great Japanese stallion Deep Impact to start in the Derby. He was produced by the Galileo mare Rododendron and added a second Group 1 to his resume following the Vertem Futurity Trophy last fall.
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