Azmeel trial compelling evidence for Chabal
The flying dismount was a sure sign that Frankie Dettori was happy but it may have been more with half a thought to another horse than the one who was winning at Chester.
In the days before he transferred to Godolphin, Dettori and John Gosden were a regular partnership which – with Gosden’s stable jockey, William Buick, suspended – was successfully reprised with Azmeel in the Group Three Addleshaw Goddard Dee Stakes.
Chester can often be like a lesson handed out from the school of hard knocks for a still inexperienced colt and Dettori eased Azmeel on to the rail but off the early pace that was set by the free-running Party Doctor. After a mid-race manoeuvre to get around Prompter, when he began trailing with five furlongs to run, Dettori was still only fifth at the start of the home turn and, in the home straight, needed to find a gap.
It appeared between Rasmy and Dancing David and Amzeel slotted through it was some aplomb to beat Dancing David by a half-length the seemed value for a fair bit more and, again at this meeting, the Aidan O’Brien runner, Encompassing, was a not a factor in fifth.
Dettrori always likes to give the crowd value for money and treated them to that flying dismount and he was in flying form when he said: “The key with this horse is to get him settled. Once I had him settled then it was a question of bide my time and find the splits. He did all that and plus he showed great tenacity to fight when he had to.”
Gosden was, as is usual for him, in an analytical frame of mind when he reviewed the race. “He got a bit of a bump out of the gate and it slightly set him alight. Frankie was intent on settling him; he settled him a long way back and then I’m afraid we got clipped into over at the five. And you want to be on your near-fore around here and that knocked him onto his off-fore. I think he’s done well to re-organise, he and Frankie, and come through and win the race. It didn’t go quite as smoothly as we hoped but he’s gone and got the job done.
“If you intend to run in these big races, they can be a lot of hurly burly, so it gets him a little used to it.”
The big race that Gosden had in mind was the Investec Derby, so did Dettori but for the jockey that turned his thoughts to Chabal. The Godolphin-trained colt beat Azmeel in the Classic Trial at Sandown Park last month and is due to run in the Dante Stakes at York on Thursday. “I think we were beaten fair and square, but we did get tired in the last furlong at Sandown,” Gosden admitted. “But I think it franks the form of the Classic Trial. We’ve come here, handled Chester well, and from that point of view there’s no reason, if the owner wishes to go to Epsom, that he doesn’t go to Epsom.
“He’s come on. He went there about 80 per cent. It’s been a difficult spring with the horses and it’s not a spring you want to be hard on them; you want to let them come a bit in their own time. He’s come here at 95 today and, with a bit of luck, I might have him spot-on by the first week of June.”
Sir Michael Stoute’s horses appear to be spot-on and Harbinger proved that by winning the Group Three Boodles Diamond Ormonde Stakes. Harbinger had to concede a 3lb penalty, for his victory in the John Porter Stakes at Newbury last month, which made his performance to beat Age Of Aquarius (officially rated 1lb his superior) by one-and-a-half lengths all the more impressive; although the runner-up looked like another O’Brien-trained runner who will improve for this first run of the season.
“He’s a beautifully balanced horse and we’ve been pleased with his two races this year,” Stoute said of the winner, who now appears to be ready to fulfil the talent that he showed in the first half of his three-year-old season. “He had a problem with his palate, he had that corrected and he looked good at Newbury and he looked smooth here,” Stoute added. “He’s a horse with a great mind. Nothing fazes him; he’s got a very good temperament.
“I think a mile-and-a-half is his best trip. The one concern we had was the trip round here if the ground was very testing. He showed in the John Porter and the Gordon Stakes how good he is at a mile-and-a-half and that’s his preferred distance.”
Stoute is a master of training a slow-maturing type but his attention will now be turned to one his Derby candidates when he runs Desert Myth in the totesport Lingfield Derby Trial. “I had him in the Vase, I had him in the Dee, I’ve got him in the Derby Trial and that was a late decision,” Stoute explained. “After the second race [yesterday] I decided not to ship him down here and we’ll wait and go to Lingfield, because I felt the ground could be very soft today. It was still raining at that stage so I don’t know if I’ve done the right thing. But the die is cast, move on.”
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