Tactic looks right move for Goodwood Cup
The third day of the Glorious Goodwood meeting proves that opposites can attract with the two highlight races at both ends of the distance scale.
The stayers take centre stage with the Group Two Artemis Goodwood Cup, and Age Of Aquarius heads a field of 12 as he attempts to snap a run of three successive second places from as many starts this season.
The last of those was a battling neck second to Rite of Passage in the Gold Cup at Royal Ascot, with Purple Moon another six lengths away in third and Kite Wood in seventh, both of whom run again in this race.
Four-year-olds have a reasonable record in the Goodwood Cup but Aidan O’Brien did say that Age Of Aquarius had a hard race at Ascot and hinted that he may have backed off the gelding a little after that to give him time to recover. He may well prove himself in the long-distance ranks but this time it may pay to side with another newcomer in Tactic.
John Dunlop’s four-year-old has been something of a slow burner but came to the fore when he won a Listed race at York in May by 14 lengths. The result appeared to have an element of fluke about it, given the ease with which Tactic pulled away from his field. But the clock watchers noted that he broke the track record and he backed up that performance when he went to Ireland the following month and won the Group Three Curragh Cup.
Tactic beat Profound Beauty by two lengths who herself had beaten Age Of Aquarius by a half-length earlier in the season.
The Group Two Audi King George Stakes marks not only for first British runner for top American trainer Todd Pletcher but also the first American-trained horse to run at Goodwood. Starfish Bay won on the turf at Gulfstream Park and Monmouth Park this year and the filly also set a new course record for five-and-a-half furlongs at Monmouth in June last year.
The filly, who will be ridden by Frankie Dettori, tends to break well but it is something of a guess as to how she will handle the downhill undulations at Goodwood, which will be unlike any track she will have encountered in her homeland.
By contrast Borderlescott has finished out of the first three only once in five starts at Goodwood and, although he has yet to win this season, he has run some sound races in defeat, most notably his one-and-three-quarter-length third to Equiano in the Group One King’s Stand Stakes at the royal meeting.
If there is trademark horse for a trainer then Motrice does seem to carry the hallmark of Sir Mark Prescott. A home-bred by owner Kirsten Rausing, Motrice made no impression in three runs as juvenile. She is a archetypal stoutly-bred horse with which this trainer excels and the filly has improved with the step up in distance, having won three times over 14 furlongs.
The Group Three Moet Hennessy Fillies’ Stakes represents a step up in class instead of distance but this half-sister to Foreign Affairs, a multiple winner at Listed level, could still be improving and the Prescott yard has a 35% strike-rate since the beginning of June.
Prescott is a trainer who is noted for his patience and Henry Cecil has clearly been waiting for the right opportunity for Rigidity. The colt went close in two handicaps earlier this season and his one-and-a-quarter-length defeat by Dandino, at Doncaster in April, reads well enough for him to win the TurfTV Summer Vase Handicap.
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