George: ‘A hell of a run under the conditions’

FROM Argentina via Europe to Dubai, and from New York to LA, Saturday night’s Breeders’ Cup Classic truly underscored the meeting’s claim to be the world thoroughbred championships.

Invasor’s victory in the $5m dirt showdown over a mile and a quarter was celebrated in Argentina, where the four-year-old was bred, Uruguay, where he won that country’s triple crown, and Dubai, whose Sheikh Hamdam bin Rashid al Maktoum bought the horse and shipped him from South America to the United States and trainer Kiaran McLoughlin.

Among those licking their wounds were the Californian connections of Lava Man and Sheikh Hamdam’s younger brother Sheikh Mohammed, whose New York-trained three-year-old Bernardini failed to respond when put under pressure for the first time in his short career by Invasor.