The animal athlete legend, Frankel, closes one of the brightest horse racing chapters
Everything good comes to end, and so did the magnificent career of the four-year-old bay colt, Frankel. He retired brimming with dignity and honour, an unbeaten from fourteen starts of the career. His success in the Champion Stakes was only slightly over
shadowed due to the heavy ground conditions that he had never come across before. The heavy conditions for a horse like Frankel, with the deceptive speed and thundering action, is no less than a curse, a test that he passed with flying colours.
The half-sleepy start of the top miler of the world, after breaking from the third stall in companion ship with jockey, Tom Queally, made the record attendance of 32,000 spectators at the Ascot race course a little doubtful about the spectacle for which
they had gathered.
Just like any champion, the Sir Henry Cecil trained measured what the opponents had to offer, scrutinized their strategies, waited for them to execute the plan, and then showed his own cards by bursting into speed in the straight.
Frankel had previously won in the conditions that best suited, and taking up the last challenge for which the ground was not truly friendly, he proved that nothing was impossible for him. He has been the champion for the last three years and has now put
a full stop to achievement by bagging the highest prize money that a race offers.
“He has so much class,” said Queally. “A bit of 4x4 kicked in today. When he missed the break I thought 'well, I know what I’m riding I’m not going to worry about a length’. At the finish I gave him one crack because I wasn’t going to let him get complacent
in that ground. He didn’t bounce on it like he normally does and I noticed that going to the start.”
Cecil concurred with Queally. “He laboured on the ground and wasn’t happy,” he said, “but he was very relaxed. I have probably got him too relaxed – it used to be the other way. I have enjoyed every moment of training him although it has been stressful at
times."
The owner, Prince Khalid Abdullah, has stamped the race as the final one for Frankel who will now attend to his stud duties at Banstead Manor Stud.
According to the champion jockey, Frankie Dettori, Frankel is ‘the finest equine specimen this planet has ever seen’.
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