Hot Rod Charlie gets a run over Meydan track in Al Maktoum Challenge Round 2

Hot Rod Charlie spent a good portion of the last 16 months out on the road. Based in California with trainer Doug O’Neill, he shipped to Keeneland in October 2020 to start in the Breeders’ Futurity. During his 3-year-old campaign of 2021, Hot Rod Charlie traveled to Fair Grounds in Louisiana, to Churchill Downs (where he was third in the Kentucky Derby), to Belmont Park, to Monmouth Park in New Jersey, and to Parx Racing in Pennsylvania.

The colt doesn’t mind getting on a plane and living like a nomad, which makes him a great candidate for international racing and has led Hot Rod Charlie to make his 4-year-old debut Friday at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai.

Hot Rod Charlie has traveled a long way from home to find a pot of gold – the $12 million Dubai World Cup on March 26. O’Neill and Hot Rod Charlie’s group of owners decided the best path to those riches runs through the Group 2, $350,000 Al Maktoum Challenge Round 2, the featured race among seven Friday at Meydan.

Hot Rod Charlie is one of a dozen entered to race 1,900 meters, about 1 3/16 miles, around two turns. He drew post 3 and will be ridden by William Buick, who substitutes for Hot Rod Charlie’s regular rider, California-based Flavien Prat.

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Hot Rod Charlie along with several O’Neill-trained stablemates, four of whom race Friday, shipped to Dubai in mid-January without incident and settled in comfortably, O’Neill said last week. Buick rode Hot Rod Charlie through a half-mile dirt workout on Jan. 27, and Hot Rod Charlie should be suitably fit to perform to standard having just started Dec. 26. In that race, the San Antonio, Hot Rod Charlie took a surprise loss to Express Train. In his previous performance, a well-beaten fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Classic, he also did not quite show his very best.

Nonetheless, Hot Rod Charlie is supposed to win his World Cup prep. His official rating, 122, is a massive 14 points higher than any of his opponents, and with seven weeks before the World Cup, there’s no pressing concern for Buick to leave too much in reserve Friday.

O’Neill’s second entrant, Go On, finished fourth last out in the San Antonio, the top performance of his seven-start career. He, too, is a 4-year-old, one that looks progressive, but Go On never has raced farther than 1 1/16 miles and might not want this much distance.

Everfast, second in the 2019 Preakness, won his Dubai debut Dec. 2, a 1,600-meter conditions race, but the one to keep an eye on Friday is Al Nefud. The lightly raced 4-year-old Dubawi colt takes a step up in class but has prospered in two races this winter after being tried for the first time on dirt.

The Al Maktoum Challenge Round 2 is the fifth of seven races on a card that ends with the Group 2, $180,000 Balanchine Stakes, an 1,800-meter grass race for fillies and mares. Pevensey Bay captured the Cape Verdi Stakes last month but seems an unlikely repeat winner in a 10-horse field with six Godolphin runners. Among that sextet is 4-year-old Creative Flare, last seen finishing fourth Sept. 18 at Belmont in the Jockey Club Oaks Invitational.

O’Neill has runners in three other races – Get Back Goldie in race 2, Strongconstitution in race 4, and Khantaro d’Oro in race 6.

First post for the program is 9 a.m. Eastern. You can catch all the action at DRFBets.com.