Suave Richard takes inside route to Japan Cup victory

Suave Richard cleaved to the fence under jockey Oisin Murphy and then cut down 3-year-old filly Curren Bouquetd’or to win the Group 1, $5.25 million Japan Cup by three-quarters of a length Sunday at Tokyo Racecourse.

Murphy, a 24-year-old Ireland-born rider who was champion jockey in Great Britain this year, had been booked to ride Curren Bouquetd’or but swapped mounts when unable to make the low weight at which the filly raced Sunday due to age and sex allowances. Murphy, who rode last winter in Japan, had worked Suave Richard in cheek pieces and suggested trainer Yasushi Shono use them in Sunday’s race. Whether through the equipment change or some other motivating factor, 5-year-old Suave Richard ran the race of his life Sunday to end a seven-start losing streak and capture just the second Group 1 of his career.

It’s not like Sunday’s win came out of nowhere. Suave Richard had finished second to Rey de Oro (a disappointing 11th Sunday as the 4.2-1 tepid favorite) in the 2017 Japanese Derby, was third in March in the Group 1 Sheema Classic on the Dubai World Cup card, and a year ago finished third in the Japan Cup won by Almond Eye. Almond Eye’s connections passed this race in favor of the Hong Kong Cup on Dec. 8, nor did any international horses show up to contest this Japan Cup, and Suave Richard, despite his lack of Group 1 success, was just a 5.1-1 chance in the race.

Murphy said his plan for the race wound up coming to fruition, and that plan evidently involved saving all the ground as Suave Richard stuck to the rail for nearly the entire 1 1/2-mile trip around a chewed-up Tokyo course labeled yielding. Daiwa Cagney set the pace and still had a lead of several lengths turning into Tokyo’s 500-meter homestretch as Suave Richard moved up from seventh position to occupy the space vacated when Curren Bouquetd’or came off the rail to make her move. Murphy briefly probed an outside run around the tiring pacesetter, but Curren Bouquetd’or and jockey Akihide Tsumura took that spot and Murphy steered left again, Suave Richard continuing his steady, sustained bid and outlasting the filly to the finish.

Wagnerian, second choice at 4.2-1, made mild outside progress to finish third, three-quarters length out of second. The winner was clocked in 2:25.90, third-slowest time in the race this century.

Shono trains Suave Richard for owner Northern Racing. Suave Richard is by Heart’s Cry out of the Unbridled’s Song mare, Pirrammima, a daughter of the two-time American Grade 2 winner Career Collection.