South African export Soft Falling Rain failed to repeat his 2013 win in the $1 million Godolphin Mile, falling a length short of another South African export, Variety Club, in a sharp renewal Saturday at Meydan Racecourse of the one-mile race over Tapeta.
The 5-year-old Japanese mare Straight Girl is in the best form of her career, having won six of her last seven starts. Sunday, Straight Girl will be favored to win her first Grade 1 race in the $1,935,357 Takamatsunomiya Kinen at Chukyo Racecourse in Nagoya, Japan.
At $5 million each, the Dubai Duty Free and the Sheema Classic are half as lucrative as the Dubai World Cup, but both races – the Duty Free in particular – drew fields every bit as strong and deep as the main event Saturday night in Dubai.
When post positions were drawn Wednesday for the Dubai World Cup, Ron the Greek had the outside post in a tough 16-runner field. The wide berth hampers Ron the Greek’s chances in a race that has drawn entrants who made their last starts in Dubai, England, Hong Kong, Japan, and Saudi Arabia.
Two of the better-known entrants in a Dubai World Cup lacking big names drew bookend post positions when the five Group 1 races on Saturday’s Dubai World Cup card were drawn Wednesday.
Final declarations for the eight Thoroughbred races on Saturday’s Dubai World Cup card were released Monday, and the $10 million World Cup is on track to go with a full field of 16 runners.
Sixteen runners are considered likely for the $10 million Dubai World Cup, though the 19th edition of the race will have no representatives from North America for the first time in its history.
Lord Windermere closed from last in a field of 13 and survived a stewards’ inquiry for a historic win in Friday’s $913,000 Cheltenham Gold Cup at Cheltenham Racecourse in western England.
Breeders’ Cup has assigned its director of racing and nominations to work in Europe for six months this year, the organization announced on Friday, underlining its efforts to drum up participation from overseas horsemen and seek new growth in foreign betting markets.
More of That, a 6-year-old gelding making his fifth start, scored a minor upset in Thursday’s $457,000 World Hurdle at Cheltenham, holding off a sustained threat from the previously unbeaten mare Annie Power in the three-mile race.
