Bob’s Worth will be a strong favorite to win the $913,000 Cheltenham Gold Cup for the second consecutive year on Friday, and give trainer Nicky Henderson a third win in the last four years in the prestigious steeplechase race.
Big Buck’s won the three-mile World Hurdle at Cheltenham Racecourse for four consecutive years from 2009-12 before being sidelined with a tendon injury in late 2012. More than a year after the injury was detected, the 11-year-old Big Buck’s is back racing, and back at Cheltenham in western England for Thursday’s $457,000 World Hurdle.
Sire De Grugy, a winner of eight of 11 career starts in steeplechases, is favored to win the richest race of his career in Wednesday’s $581,000 Queen Mother Champion Chase at Cheltenham Racecourse in western England.
Other than Shea Shea’s successful return to action in the Meydan Sprint, and, to a slightly lesser extent, Vercingetorix’s victory in the Jebel Hatta Stakes, the results of the Super Saturday card at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai did little to bring into focus the blurry picture still being projected of the March 29 Dubai World Cup card.
No horse has won more Grade 1 races than Hurricane Fly, the 10-year-old hurdler from Ireland. From November 2008 until January of this year, Hurricane Fly has won 19 Grade 1 races for hurdlers in England and Ireland. Two of Hurricane Fly’s wins were the Champion Hurdle at Cheltenham, a race he is favored to win for the third time Tuesday.
Mike de Kock, South Africa’s leading trainer, will saddle Vercingetorix, Shea Shea, and Soft Falling Rain, who all should be favored in key preps for the Dubai World Cup on Meydan's Super Saturday program.
Huge fields, if not horses especially well known in North America, abound on the so-called Super Saturday card March 8 at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai.
There were a pair of Group 3 stakes on the six-race program Thursday at Meydan Racecourse in Dubai, but Ihtimal’s performance in the Group 3, $250,000 UAE Oaks stole the show.
Last year during the Dubai World Cup Carnival, Trade Storm finished 11th in his first race of the meeting, then improved massively and impressively won a pair of grass races over the Meydan course before finishing a commendable fourth in the Group 1 Dubai Duty Free to end his Dubai campaign. We will see if a similar pattern unfolds Thursday when Trade Storm makes his second start of the 2014 Dubai World Cup Carnival in the Group 3, $250,000 Zabeel Mile.
Copana Rickey, a 274-1 longshot, scored a shocking win in Sunday’s $1.91 million February Stakes on dirt at Tokyo Racecourse, the first Grade 1 of the year in that country.
