Gleneagles-Golden Horn On, But In The Balance

Leopardstown officials were on Thursday intent on ensuring that the keenly anticipated stand-off between Gleneagles (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) and Golden Horn (GB) (Cape Cross {Ire}) goes ahead, with the G1 QIPCO Irish Champion S. moved to 65 minutes earlier on the card due to concerns about the effects of forecast heavy rain. Following the shift of the race, it will now be the first to be staged on fresh ground on the outside track with the preceding contests on the inside course. The rain is due on Friday, with Saturday predicted to be dry and Nessa Joyce, Leopardstown’s racing and operations manager, outlined the management’s initiative on Thursday. “We’re trying to do as much as we can for our Group 1 races to give them the best ground,” she explained. “We’d already planned in advance by making two tracks, the first four on the inside and the last four on the outside. We are going to have the Qipco Irish Champion S. as the first race run on the outside track. It hasn’t been raced on at all this year.” Regarding the forecast, Joyce is in the dark. “The rain is still an unknown factor. It’s fast ground at the moment,” she added. “On the outside track it’s good-to-firm, firm in places. We are looking at another dry day today so it might tighten up another bit, so we are well prepared if there is rain coming and any that comes or way. We still don’t know and because of the 48-hour declarations we’ve had to make the decision today. We have simply swapped the fifth and seventh races. We spoke to all the trainers before we did it and they were happy to do it and that the jockeys would not be inconvenienced if they were coming from Doncaster. We felt it was in the best interests on the day and give everyone a crack at the best ground.”

Golden Horn’s conditioner, John Gosden was happy with the decision and said at Doncaster on Thursday, “Now we have to go and rain-watch in Ireland, so the game goes on,” he said. “I understand what they are doing by providing fresh ground and let’s hope what rain has been forecast doesn’t come.”

With the only withdrawal on Thursday being the G1 1000 Guineas and G1 Nassau S. heroine Legatissimo (Ire) (Danehill Dancer {Ire}), who is bound for the same card’s G1 Coolmore Fastnet Rock Matron S., the contest has stood up well and has quality in depth despite having only eight runners. Aidan O’Brien also has the GI Secretariat S. winner Highland Reel (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) and G1 Irish 1000 Guineas and G1 Coronation S. runner-up Found (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) to represent him and, like Gosden, is keeping a close eye on the weather. “Unfortunately it’s very hard to call with the terrible weather forecast and we’ll declare Gleneagles and wait,” he said. “We’d obviously love to run him at Leopardstown, but asking him to get the trip on that [unsuitable] ground wouldn’t be fair on him. I’ve no doubt he’s a genuine miler, but if the rain came it would make it messy for a lot of mine. Under French rules we can’t declare Gleneagles in two places, so we can’t declare him to run for Saturday and Sunday–that’s the rule so what can you do?”