All those years ago when Sheikh Mohammed came across to the UK for the first time intent on buying a few racehorses, I doubt it would have entered his mind how his involvement in the worldwide racing industry would develop, writes Tony Stafford. More so, that in 2025, with himself nowadays a rare visitor to this country, he could ever have a UK/US quadruple big-race triumph over one weekend as he just did.
On Friday, he won the Kentucky Oaks, for three-year-old fillies at Churchill Downs; on Saturday the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket and the Kentucky Derby at Churchill; and yesterday the 1,000 Guineas back at HQ.
Equally, I doubt whether it even occurred to him that almost half a century on, he would have progressed from the number three of four horse-racing mad sons of the Dubai Ruler Sheikh Rashid. But first, his eldest brother Sheikh Maktoum died, and he had already supplanted next-in-line (by mutual agreement we believe) the more recently deceased Sheikh Hamdan, to become the Emirate’s undisputed boss.
The racing set-up he initially organised had as its principal advisors Robert Acton, John Ferguson and Simon Crisford. The horses were in top UK stables, such as (Sir) Henry Cecil, who trained Oh So Sharp to the filly equivalent of the Triple Crown (1,000 Guineas, Oaks and St Leger) in 1985, a full 40 years ago. The last colt’s Triple Crown came from Vincent O’Brien’s Nijinsky eight years earlier.
It was around the time of Oh So Sharp when I experienced my close and personal moment in a car driven by the late Richard Casey, a superb jumps trainer but at the time the man who used to prepare the (Sir) Michael Stoute horses before they went into training.
John Leat was then the Sheikh’s inseparable (in the UK) personal assistant. He and I were with the other three gentlemen while we two conducted an impromptu interview in Richard’s car at Dullingham near Newmarket. The one phrase I remember from the conversation was, “People expect to build a breeding operation in five to ten years. I’m not sure you could do it in less than 30!”
For years, the development was patchy, for all the good horses they raced, often bought by Acton and Stroud, later by Ferguson. Acton and Stroud moved aside in a significant shake-up as, much later, did Ferguson, while Crisford turned to training with great success, now in concert with son Ed.
Now though, Stroud and another of the Sheikh’s former trainers, David Loder, is back at the helm of buying at auction while Simon Crisford is never too far away from the deliberations, so much so that he maintains a big satellite winter team in Dubai along with his powerful Newmarket yard.
Of course, the advent of Godolphin at around the turn of the century with local Dubaian Saeed bin Suroor taking centre stage coincided with a big explosion of success. Even when the very popular Saeed was seemingly demoted to a secondary role with the emergence of Mahmood al Zarooni, he kept smiling and continued to be the polite, readily accessible man he remains today.
I was pleased that in yesterday’s 1,000 Guineas, when interviewed beforehand, bin Suroor reckoned his filly Elwateen, a once raced 22/1 shot running for the first time on grass, would go well. She finished fourth and, considering her inexperience, the future looks bright.
The al Zarooni years ended abruptly with the finding of non-permitted substances in several of his horses. His Encke, which won the St Leger in 2012 and thereby denied the Aidan O’Brien-trained Camelot the Triple Crown after that one had already taken the 2,000 Guineas and Derby, was one of them, but his test ironically was clear when his St Leger sample was later analysed.
Al Zarooni’s banishment was the opening that led to Charlie Appleby’s promotion, and how he has taken it with both hands. Ruling Court’s win from the tactically outsmarted runner-up and short-price Gosden-trained favourite Field Of Gold and Kieran Shoemark was followed yesterday with another HQ masterclass by Buick on Desert Flower in the 1,000 Guineas.
In her case, it didn’t take a seven-figure auction bid to secure the daughter of 2,000 Guineas winner Night Of Thunder. She was a homebred and while there was no fluke about the result, the runner-up Flight almost ‘did a Night Of Thunder’, drifting from one side to the other, although contrastingly to Desert Flower’s sire, out to the right to join the main pack rather than the other way round.
I thought for a while she looked to have the race won, so easily did she go past the pacemaker on her wing, but she seemed to get lonely, hence the drift to seek the company of her companions.
Flight is trained by the emerging Ollie Sangster whose other runner, Simmering, stayed on to be third. It looked a very strong field beforehand and there is no reason to believe these fillies will not prove that to be the case time after time as the season progresses.
As I mentioned above, 40 years on from that meeting at Dullingham, a scan through the Charlie Appleby team of 225 reveals that having been sustained for so long in the unequal fight with Coolmore over the past two Galileo-blessed decades, by their champion Dubawi, newer stallions are moving in to help level up the playing field.
Well to the fore in Charlie’s list are former Horse Of The Year Gaiyyath, the top juvenile Pinatubo, Blue Point, and freshman sire Space Blues.
And yet, despite those new ‘home team’ blood lines, Saturday’s convincing winner of the 2,000 Guineas, Ruling Court, was a son of Justify, who stands at Coolmore’s US arm, Ashford stud in Kentucky. He twice eluded the attentions of the Coolmore team at auctions. Sold originally to the ultra-shrewd former jump jockey Norman Williamson for $150k at Keeneland in September 2023, he so impressed the attendees at the Arqana May breeze-up sale the following May that he changed hands for €2,300,000. Nice one Norman!
Scanning through the team, Ruling Court was the sole three-year-old Justify although three more colts by City Of Troy’s sire are among 110 juveniles. Wootton Bassett (300k a pop at Coolmore this year) also illustrates the more pragmatic approach by the present Godolphin management, with six. The first of them to run, Rising Power (€600k at Goffs Orby Book 1 last autumn) made a winning start yesterday at Newmarket, the final leg of an Appleby/Buick treble.
Friday’s Kentucky Oaks heroine, Good Cheer, mirrors Desert Flower as she is also unbeaten, in her case seven from seven, the latest three this year. She was also favourite (7/5) and came wide on the home bend to run past a quartet battling on the lead with extreme ease. Brad Cox has been very patient with her, moving her gradually up the grades. She has been favourite every time, and Friday’s winning margin of two and a quarter lengths was the narrowest, if you can say that about an overwhelming superiority. She too is a homebred, by Medaglia d’Oro.
It was closer in the Kentucky Derby. Sovereignty, a son of 22-year-old stallion Into Mischief, trained by veteran Bill Mott, won by one and a half lengths with a big stretch run to deny the favourite Journalism on a soupy track after heavy rain fell all day. The Coolmore team has made several shrewd in training deals in the US in recent years into careers like Justify’s. Journalism has also been the subject of an arrangement with his present owners to stand him at stud at Ashford when he retires. He has something to put right then over the rest of the season, while nearer to home evidence suggests the Coolmore runners from Ballydoyle seem to be a couple of weeks short of peak.
One that stayed in Ireland this weekend was The Lion In Winter, winner of last year’s seven-furlong Acomb Stakes at York when even-money shot Ruling Court suffered his only defeat in third. He is expected to turn out for the Dante Stakes. His owners will be hoping that the team quickly moves into top speed. Interestingly, The Lion In Winter is the 7/2 favourite for the Betfred Derby with Ruling Court next best at 4/1. More exciting times ahead.
- TS
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- Monday Musings: Hegemony
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