There are just five entrants in Saturday’s Group 1 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Ascot in England, but the race is a dandy, with two champions, Workforce and St. Nicholas Abbey, opposed by Rewilding and the dangerous 3-year-old Nathaniel. The fifth horse is Debussy, who won the 2010 Arlington Million but has shown little so far in 2011.
Blue Bunting rallied from fifth in the final quarter-mile to win Sunday’s Group 1 Irish Oaks at the Curragh, her second major trophy of the year
Wonder of Wonders, the runner-up in the English Oaks last month, will be an odds-on favorite against a strong field in Sunday’s Group 1 Irish Oaks at the Curragh.
Neither Irish Derby winner Treasure Beach nor French Derby winner Reliable Man could produce his best form Thursday in the Grand Prix de Paris, and it was unheralded Meandre up late under Maxime Guyon to catch pacesetting Seville in the final furlong.
The undefeated Reliable Man will have three Aidan O’Brien-trained runners, headed by Irish Derby winner Treasure Beach, among his opponents Thursday in an appealing edition of the Group 1 Grand Prix de Paris at Longchamp.
Dream Ahead, the English joint champion 2-year-old of 2010 with the undefeated Frankel, gave jockey Hayley Turner her first win in a Group 1 race in Saturday’s July Cup at Newmarket, England.
Timepiece, a Juddmonte Farms homebred trained by Henry Cecil and ridden by Tom Queally, scored by far the biggest win of her career in the Group 1 Falmouth, defeating favored Sahpresa by 1 1/4 lengths in the one-mile race restricted to fillies and mares.
Frederick Engels extended his stakes-winning streak to two races, and the mare Crystal Capella won her first career stakes against males in Group 2 stakes at Newmarket, England, on Thursday.
Delegator, unplaced in the last two runnings of the Breeders’ Cup Mile, may finally win the first Group 1 race of his career in Saturday’s July Cup for sprinters at Newmarket, England.
Frederick Engels, the winner of the 24-runner Windsor Castle Stakes at Royal Ascot on June 14, makes his group stakes debut against just seven rivals in Thursday’s Group 2 July Stakes for 2-year-old colts and geldings at Newmarket, England.
