Rain threat to Dylan’s hopes of Classic success
Riding a pony yesterday morning, O'Brien accompanied the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe winner as he was introduced to the tight oval turf track by work rider Pat Lillis and the Ballydoyle trainer later admitted that if local weather forecasters get it right and there was heavy rain on the Jersey Shore last night, then there could be a less than poetic end to Dylan Thomas’s Breeders’ Cup bid under jockey Johnny Murtagh.
The four-year-old son of Danehill has done enough already this season to warrant a horse of the year award and a victory in the Breeders’ Cup Turf will undoubtedly rubber-stamped the nomination. All week, the expectation has been that he will do just that, with the bookmakers installing him as an odds-on favourite and Todd Pletcher, trainer of second choice English Channel wishing the Irish raider would not turn up.
Now they and O’Brien will wait to see what greets them this morning and if there was to be an overnight downpour, Dylan Thomas’s connections will be praying Monmouth’s new fast-draining turf course lives up to its reputation.
Re-emerging after the light workout from the quarantine barn which has housed all the British and Irish contenders at Monmouth Park this week, O’Brien, noting his star’s extended stride, said: “Dylan is such a long, long mover that soft ground is a disadvantage. We were lucky that he overcame it in the Arc, but everyone knows he’s best on concrete.”
That said, O’Brien was impressed with the course’s condition yesterday morning. “It’s good ground,” he said. “It’s really like Ascot. It drains very quick. If it rains, it will take the water very well. It’s a credit to them, that’s some ground after that much rain. It’s like a carpet out there. The ground out there is better than Longchamp at the moment but much depends on what happens tonight.”
“We didn’t do much with any of them, really,” O’Brien said. “They worked before they came and they walked the last few days. When we’re coming in this close, you can only do more harm than good.”
Meanwhile George Washington, an unlucky sixth last year on his dirt debut, impressed his trainer as he worked on the Polytrack yesterday. O’Brien described the exercise as “a canter on the dirt. It was lovely…had the whole track to himself.” Yet the Danehill four-year-old’s final three furlongs under Lillis were timed in 40 seconds flat.
While Lillis rode ‘Gorgeous George’, his race jockey Mick Kinane was out on John Oxx’s Timarwa, who will oppose Henry Cecil’s Passage Of Time in the Filly & Mare Turf. Asked later about George and his chances on a possibly sloppy main track, Kinane said: “It could be anything…I just hope he can see more than I’m going to be able to.
“He got in trouble last year and couldn’t quicken again, otherwise he’d have been a couple of lengths closer. He has every right to be here. The (American) three-year-olds have had it busy this year and he’s a fresh horse coming in.”
Asked if he had been influential in the decision of O’Brien and owners John Magnier, Michael Tabor and Derrick Smith to send George Washington back for another Classic, Kinane said: “He did handle the dirt last year and it was a big first run on it, and I thought if we’d had a prep run, we’d have had a big say in it. It was a very, very strong Classic field last year.”
