Eclipse no two-horse race - Bell
Michael Bell has warned that Saturday’s Coral-Eclipse Stakes is no two-horse race despite its billing as a match between Motivator and Shamardal.
The trainer gave Motivator a spin up Warren Hill at Newmarket today and reports the Vodafone Derby winner to be in great shape for the Group One contest.
“He did his last main piece of work last Friday. Since then he’s been doing routine canters and went up Warren Hill this morning,” he said.
“Basically he’s very fit and he’s in very good form.”
Bell is happy that seasoned Group One campaigners like Starcraft and Altieri are taking on his superstar at Sandown.
Former Australian ace Starcraft, now trained in Newmarket by Luca Cumani, has been confirmed a definite starter, while the seven-year-old Altieri is on his way to England from Milan.
Bell said: “It’s good that a horse of the calibre of Starcraft is going to take part.
“I think the press are wrong building it up as a two-horse race. There are some very good horses in there.
“The Italian horse is coming over, I believe, and he’s got good form too.”
Motivator will be attempting to take his unbeaten record to five and to become the first horse since Nashwan in 1989 to complete the Derby/Eclipse double.
Philip Robinson has been booked to partner Starcraft at the behest of owner Paul Makin.
The imposing chestnut is as short as 5-1 with the sponsors and Makin did not want to take a chance on the fitness of Darryll Holland, who rode him last time.
“He is a definite runner and Philip Robinson will ride,” he told At The Races.
“Darryll had a fall recently and it is a hot race, probably like a world championship race, and I have got to have a jockey that is 100 per cent fit.
“I suggested it and liked the idea.
“He’s been a very successful rider in Hong Kong for many years, which is a great proving ground, and if you can win the championship there, you’ve got to be outstanding.”
Makin was won over by Robinson’s front-running ride on New Morning over course and distance in the Brigadier Gerard Stakes last month, and added: “Every jockey should get a hold of that tape, it was sensational.”
Starcraft was a crack performer over a variety of distances in Australia but took a while to settle into his new surroundings, having arrived in the grip of winter.
Makin was satisfied with his first run in this country when he was a running-on third to Valixir in the Queen Anne Stakes earlier this month.
He continued: “He got a pretty deep cut in his off-hind fetlock when something obviously clipped him, but I think it was a nice run.
“He gave them a big start at the top of the straight and he made up ground on the leaders, so I suppose it has to be a good run.
“When he first arrived from Australia it was snowing and horses are different to humans and need to be properly acclimatised. But the horse is nearly there now.”
Altieri’s trainer, Vittorio Caruso, is not running scared of Motivator and Shamardal – even though he describes them as “the best horses in Europe”.
Altieri may be the oldest horse in the line-up, but he arrives in top form, having won the Premio Presidente della Republica for the second successive year in Rome last month, form which has stood up since.
Caruso said: “The two Derby winners are the best horses in Europe in my opinion. We will find out on Saturday if it is possible for my horse to beat them.
“He is in excellent form and he has a good chance. Although he is a seven-year-old, he is a little bit better than he was last year. His form suggests he is.
“I have had this race in mind for him for some time. He should have come over for the Eclipse last year, but had to miss it as he had a few little problems.”
Altieri is scheduled to arrive at the Esher track tomorrow via Troyes in France.
Caruso rates him as good, if not better, than his previous Eclipse runner Misil, who was second to Opera House 12 years ago.
Clerk of the course Andrew Cooper is considering watering for the first time this week because of a basically dry weather forecast ahead of the meeting.
“We had a forecast saying we could see anything ranging from nothing to two inches of rain last night and we got closer to the former and measured about a millimetre and a half,” he said.
“We were lovely good ground at the weekend and first thing Monday morning, but we have had a couple of warm, breezy days and have dried out, and would not have minded a drop more rain.
“Considering how the ground is, and with the time we’ve got, it makes me think we probably will add a little bit ourselves here in the next 48 hours just to keep the ground on the fast side of good, the better side of good to firm, going into the meeting.”
