Harbinger continues to give promise of great expectations. On Friday, he displayed his stoutheartedness with a 1 1/2-length victory in the 1 5/8-mile, 89-yard Ormonde Stakes, a Chester Group 3 contest worth $111,000. Handily placed in fourth by Ryan Moore, Harbinger, a son of Dansili trained by Michael Stoute, led at the quarter pole and ran on strongly as the 8-13 favorite to defeat the Aidan O'Brien-trained Age of Aquarius. The winning time on good to soft ground was 2:56.73.

The 1 1/4-mile, Group 2 Prix Greffulhe at Saint-Cloud on Saturday is a key trial for the French Derby, but this year's $166,000 renewal includes not a single group race winner. Green Rock won the listed Criterium de l'Ouest at Craon last fall and Paris Vegas took the listed Prix Policeman at Cagnes-sur-Mer in February, but the winner is more likely to come from one of the improving, untested types in the eight-horse field.

Oct. 3 is a long way away, but the $5.2 million Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe is in the back of the minds of Christophe Clement and Neil Drysdale. Clement dropped the name of his dual Eclipse Award winner Gio Ponti into the list of 141 Arc nominees announced on Thursday by France-Galop, and Drysdale did the same with Marsh Side.

They are the only American-trained horses among the nominees for the 1 1/2-mile Arc, which hasn't had an American runner since the Billy Wright-trained El Senor finished ninth in 1991.

Harbinger can take another step forward at Chester on Friday when he goes in the $113,000 Ormonde Stakes, a 1 5/8-mile, 89-yard Group 3 contest named for the horse widely regarded as the 19th Century's best. A 4-year-old son of the red-hot stallion Dansili, Harbinger is the latest middle-distance prospect trained by Michael Stoute.

The Group 3, $106,000 Chester Vase starts the Epsom Derby trial meeting at Chester Racecourse south of Liverpool on Thursday, but don't expect to find the Derby winner in its suspect seven-runner field. None of the leading chances for the big race is running, leaving Critical Moment as the favorite for the 1 1/2-mile, 66-yard contest.

Special Duty was awarded the 1000 Guineas Stakes in the Newmarket stewards room after she was nipped on the line by Jacqueline Quest. Only a nose separated them, but the stewards ruled that the 66-1 Jacqueline Quest and her rider, Tim Queally, had carried the Stephane Pasquier-ridden 9-2 favorite right through the final sixteenth-mile and gave the $608,000 fillies classic to Special Duty.

Cutlass Bay survived a stewards' inquiry at Longchamp on Sunday to win the $398,000, Group 1 Prix Ganay. Godolphin's Andre Fabre-trained son of Halling rallied form fourth to lead inside the final furlong of the 1 5/16-mile contest but was leaning right on Shalanaya. Maxime Guyon pulled Cutlass Bay off the Aga Khan's filly to cross the line three-quarters of a length in front, and the judges later determined that the incident had not prevented Shalanaya from winning. Cutlass Bay covered the 1 5/16 miles on good ground in 2:11.80.

Jaguar Mail handled the step up in distance to two miles to win the Grade 1, $2.7 million Spring Tenno Sho at Kyoto on Sunday, defeating defending titleholder Meiner Kitz by three-quarters of a length. The Noriyuki Hori-trained son of Jungle Pocket, ridden by Australian Craig Williams, rallied to lead 50 yards from the line while traveling the distance in 3:15.70 on firm ground.

Makfi scored a 33-1 shocker in the 2000 Guineas at Newmarket on Saturday, handing the much heralded even-money favorite St Nicholas Abbey a resounding defeat.

In becoming the first French-trained horse to win the first leg of the English Triple Crown since Pennekamp in 1995, Makfi ran off to a 1 1/4-length victory over the 16-1 longshot Dick Turpin.

Cutlass Bay should rack up the first Group 1 race of his promising career on Sunday, when he will go off the favorite for Longchamp's 1 5/16-mile, $397,000 Prix Ganay. A Halling 4-year-old, Cutlass Bay made it 4 for 4 for his injury-plagued career by winning the 1 1/4--mile, Group 2 Prix d'Harcourt at Longchamp on April 11 and will have benefited from that outing.