Kingman reigns supreme in Marois

There had been a worry over whether Kingman would even take part in the Prix Jacques le Marois at Deauville, but John Gosden’s colt reigned supreme yet again once he took to the track for a fourth consecutive Group One victory yesterday.

Gosden and Teddy Grimthorpe, racing manager to owner Khalid Abdullah, had walked the Normandy course several times with concerns it might be a little too soft for the season’s finest miler. But just as he had shown in the Irish Guineas, St James’s Palace Stakes and Sussex Stakes, Kingman can produce top-level sprinting speed and with a flicker of effort from his jockey, and after James Doyle issued his instructions, the race was over.

With only five starters, it was always likely to be tactical and as the field virtually walked out of the stalls, it was left to German outsider Red Dubawi to take up the running. Doyle waited patiently before unleashing Kingman inside the final furlong and he burst two and a half lengths away from Anodin.