Almanzor, Europe’s top-rated horse of 2016, will have his long-awaited 2017 debut against five overmatched rivals in Tuesday’s Group 3 Prix Gontaut-Biron Hong Kong Jockey Club at 1 1/4 miles at Deauville, France.
Taareef takes a three-race winning streak into Sunday’s Group 1 Prix Jacques le Marois for turf milers at Deauville Racecourse in France on Sunday.
Brando won his first start outside of Great Britain, and his first Group 1, in Sunday’s $449,500 Prix Maurice de Gheest for sprinters at Deauville, France.
Bound for Nowhere had a rude introduction to European racing at Royal Ascot in June, finishing a troubled fourth in the Group 1 Commonwealth Cup for 3-year-old sprinters.
We shall see about the fall, but the spring and summer have revealed the 3-year-old filly Winter to be exceptional.
A waterlogged course helped the unheralded 7-year-old Here Comes When upset Ribchester in the Group 1 Sussex Stakes on Wednesday at Goodwood Racecourse in England.
Stradivarius, who won the Group 2 Queen’s Vase Stakes at Royal Ascot in June in his stakes debut, scored an upset in Tuesday’s Group 1, $686,800 Goodwood Cup at Goodwood Racecourse, finishing 1 3/4 lengths in front of 3-2 favorite Big Orange.
The 3-year-old filly Winter hasn't raced in more than five weeks this summer, but during her down time her stock has gone up, and she figures a solid favorite Thursday at Goodwood, where Winter meets older rivals for the first time while stretching out to 1 ¼ miles in the Group 1, $449,000 Nassau Stakes.
This is the time of year when 3-year-olds in Europe leave the playpen of age-restricted stakes to take on elders in open races, and to keep the fight fair, British racing imposes taxing penalties on the older set. The 3-year-old filly Enable, for instance, got 14 pounds (both an age and sex allowance) from the older horse Ulysses winning the Group 1 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes last week at Ascot, and in the Sussex, Churchill's 127-pound impost, which includes Ryan Moore, is seven pounds lighter than Ribchester's.
Roly Poly struggled to find herself this spring, but she is rolling now. At Deauville Racecourse on Sunday she won her second straight Group 1 by beating older female rivals in the Prix Rothschild.
