Breeders' Cup: European shippers dominate turf races

We should have seen it coming from the start. The first Breeders’ Cup race of 2020 was the Juvenile Turf Sprint on Friday. Last year at Santa Anita the six participating Europeans looked so hapless in that race that only three ran in it this season.

But Ubettabelieveit was a good third at 29-1 and Lipizzaner was right behind him at 14-1, and later Friday European shippers finished second, fourth, and fifth in the Juvenile Turf and second and third, both at long prices, in the Juvenile Fillies Turf.

On Saturday, overseas horses dominated the Breeders’ Cup turf races like never before. Glass Slippers became the first European-based winner of the Turf Sprint, and then Audarya ran down Rushing Fall to win the Filly and Mare Turf. Trainer Aidan O’Brien pulled off an epic sweep in the Mile, running one-two-three with 73-1 shot Order of Australia posting a shock victory over Circus Maximus, with Lope Y Fernandez a strong third. Finally, in the Turf, Tarnawa led a European one-two with a convincing win over favored Magical, and just like that, horses from across the pond had, for the first time, swept the Saturday grass races.

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Four European winners at a Breeders’ Cup was not unprecedented, and, in fact, in the two years the event was held during the synthetic-surface era at Santa Anita overseas shippers won five BC races.

This was only the third time Europeans won the three most important grass races – the Turf, Mile, and Filly and Mare Turf. In 2009, Midday won the Filly and Mare Turf, Goldikova took the Mile, and Conduit won the Turf. In 2003, when there were only eight Breeders’ Cup races in total, Islington won the Filly and Mare Turf, Six Perfections took the Mile, and High Chaparral won the Turf in a dead heat with California-based Johar.

Saturday also was a remarkable day of firsts. Jockey Tom Eaves gave Glass Slippers a beautiful ride to win the Turf Sprint in what not only was his first Breeders’ Cup mount but his first in America. Glass Slippers was a first Breeders’ Cup winner for Ireland-born, England-based trainer Kevin Ryan. James Fanshawe, Newmarket, England-based trainer of Audarya, also was running a horse in the U.S. for the first time.

Dermot Weld had won a Belmont Stakes, with Go and Go, and was a pioneering international traveler from his base in Ireland, but before Tarnawa won the Turf, he’d been 16-0-0-3 in Breeders’ Cup races. Aboard Tarnawa was Irish jockey Colin Keane, notching his first Breeders' Cup race during his first year with mounts at the two-day festival. None of Aidan O’Brien’s previous Breeders’ Cup wins had come in the Mile, where he’d been 0 for 24, but there he was Saturday with the first three home.

It was French jockey Pierre-Charles Boudot doing the steering on Order of Australia. Boudot had been 0-3 in the Breeders’ Cup before winning two, Audarya preceding Order of Australia in victory. Unbelievably, Boudot hadn’t initially been scheduled to ride either horse. Ioritz Mendizabal was Audarya’s jockey, but he tested positive for Covid-19 in France and was replaced by Boudot. Jockey Christophe Soumillon made it to Keeneland from France, but also returned a positive Covid test and had to give up rides on Order of Australia – who only got into the Mile, breaking from post 14, after One Master was scratched Thursday – and Tarnawa.

This was the second time Keane had ridden a horse for Weld. Keane, one of Ireland’s top riders, had ridden a horse for Weld at Cork - but only one horse. Yet it was he – rather than an American rider – to whom Weld turned for a very live ride on Tarnawa, who simply overpowered Channel Maker and Magical to win going away.

All the Europeans not trained by O’Brien fly back overseas Tuesday, while O’Brien’s contingent leaves Monday. Most will race again in 2021, but some will not. Weld reminded people Sunday that the Aga Khan, owner and breeder of Tarnawa, often retires his fillies at age 3, and Tarnawa is a 4-year-old now. It’s possible Magical could be considered for a trip to Hong Kong next month, but that figures to be the only chance she races again, as Magical, a 5-year-old, nearly was retired to become a broodmare last winter.

Circus Maximus, who ran his best race in months by finishing second, beaten a neck, in the Mile, might be a candidate to go to stud, but the O’Brien-trained colts just ahead of and behind him, Order of Australia and Lope Y Fernandez, are just 3-year-olds.

Boudot said after Saturday’s 73-1 upset, the second-longest odds ever on a BC winner, that O’Brien had referred to Order of Australia as “a special horse for this race,” and Order of Australia, racing on Lasix for the first time, ran the best race of his career by many lengths. He’d been a decent fourth in the Irish Derby over 1 1/2 miles, but has been a tricky horse to ride, as evidenced by the long suspension French authorities gave jockey Seamie Heffernan for his use of the whip on Order of Australia during a seventh-place finish in the French Derby. Heffernan maintained that his mount had threatened to put him over the outside rail. O’Brien said he figured a smaller American oval and tight turns might suit a colt who had been racing over longer distances, and he also took a good swing with longshot Lope Y Fernandez, who would have been right with the winner had he not been steadied behind a tiring Casa Creed at the three-furlong pole.

Ryan specifically mentioned the 2021 BC Turf Sprint at Del Mar as a long-term goal for Glass Slippers, while Fanshawe, also lauding Boudot’s masterful ride, said Audarya would race in 2021. He, too, hopes to return to Del Mar for another Breeders’ Cup run.

Those are two very nice horses already aimed at Breeders’ Cup races a year hence, yet there is nearly no chance that the next Breeders’ Cup will be nearly as successful for the Euros as 2020.