Mondialiste headed to Arlington Million

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – Mondialiste appears to have earned himself a third trip to North America with a good second-place finish last Saturday in the York Stakes.

Mondialiste is one of several European horses being pointed to the Aug. 13 Arlington Million, according to the International Racing Bureau, which helps recruit horses for the Million Day stakes and coordinates international travel for European interests.

Tryster, one of the best horses in Dubai last winter, is the other major player intended for the Million. In addition to Tryster, Godolphin Racing also will run Sky Hunter in the race, and Aidan O’Brien reportedly intends to send several horses for the Aug. 13 races, though their identity hasn’t yet been ascertained.

Mondialiste, a 6-year-old Galileo horse trained by David O’Meara, won the Woodbine Mile last fall over Lea and Obviously, went back to England, and came back across the Atlantic to finish a fine, closing second behind Tepin in the Breeders’ Cup Mile. But his three subsequent starts this year in Hong Kong, France, and England, produced truly dull performances, and it was only in the York last weekend that Mondialiste looked at all like his best self from 2015.

Mondialiste stretched out from eight- and nine-furlong races to 1 5/16 miles and put a real scare into the heavily favored and high-class Time Test before succumbing by three-quarters of a length. The York course is relatively flat and turns left-handed, and the Group 2 York Stakes often serves up contenders for the Million. This could be another such horse, though Tryster, most recently fifth in the Group 1 Prince of Wales’s Stakes over soft ground that doesn’t suit him, has the stronger body of work from 2016.