Godolphin’s two heavy favorites, Local Time in the UAE Oaks and Safety Check in the Zabeel Mile, both scored comfortable wins on the Thursday night card at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai.
A pair of group stakes with likely heavy favorites highlight Thursday’s seven-race card at Meydan in Dubai. Local Time is 2 for 2 in her brief dirt career and will be an odds-on favorite to win her third race of the winter in the Group 3, $250,000 UAE Oaks, while Safety Check appears formidable in the Group 2, $250,000 Zabeel Mile.
Horses based in the U.S. that are being pointed to races in Britain will have to arrive in the country 10 days prior to the race and will be subjected to a new zero-tolerance policy on the use of anabolic steroids under new rules announced by the British Horseracing Authority on Tuesday.
Hunter’s Light is likely to make his third appearance on the Dubai World Cup program next month after winning his second consecutive race in Thursday’s $200,000 Dubai Millennium Stakes at Meydan Racecourse in the United Arab Emirates.
Hunter’s Light, a Group 1 winner in Dubai and Italy who was seventh in the 2014 Arlington Million at Arlington Park, leads a field of 10 in Thursday’s $200,000 Dubai Millennium Stakes at 1 1/4 miles on turf at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai.
Dirt milers were at the center of the action Thursday night at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai, and the 3-year-olds in the Group 3, $250,000 UAE 2000 Guineas might have upstaged their elders in the Group 3, $200,000 Firebreak Stakes.
There are several rich races with tendrils climbing toward the March 28 Dubai World Cup program on the seven-race card Thursday night at Meydan, but only one of them includes a horse with a chance of making it to North America this spring.
Frankyfourfingers never had won a race of note when the Dubai World Cup Carnival began in January, and his trainer, Salem bin Ghadayer, never had won a race, period. But Thursday at Meydan, the pair teamed up to capture the Group 2, $250,000 Al Maktoum Challenge Round 2, a breakthrough for both horse and trainer.
When African Story last raced, he won the $10 million Dubai World Cup, but when he steps out onto the racetrack Thursday night at Meydan for his first start since March, there will be one very serious difference: The surface beneath African Story’s feet will be dirt.
Vercingetorix, away since April, returned to the races with a two-length win over True Story in the Group 2, $200,000 Al Rashidiya Stakes on Thursday night at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai. The comeback run suggests that the South African-bred could be a force in the more important middle-distance turf races in February and March.
