So that's why they call it the Breeders' Cup. There was Annemarie O'Brien, proudly filming as Intricately (Ire) (Fastnet Rock {Aus}) strode out of the quarantine barn on Tuesday morning–breeder not only of the filly, but also of the two boys mounted up: jockey Donnacha and, on the pony alongside, trainer Joseph. The latter, in his first season with his own stable, will be bidding to exchange one record for another when he saddles Intricately for the GI Juvenile Fillies Turf. As things stand, he holds the record as the youngest rider to win a Breeders' Cup race–he was 18 when he won the 2011 Turf on St Nicholas Abbey (Ire) (Montjeu {Ire})–but he will surrender that status to Donnacha if Intricately can in turn qualify him, still only 23, as the youngest trainer to do the same. Donnacha, who has just emulated Joseph by winning the apprentice title in Ireland, is also 18 but his birthday is a couple of months later.
Breaking records, of course, is in their blood. For in order to make history on Friday they will have to beat their father, Aidan, who saddles two fillies against Intricately.
His dozen raiders on the two-day carnival had arrived overnight and the rest of his family duly left him behind–checking them over in a white quarantine jump-suit–as Intricately, straining to leave the confines of the international barn for the first time, was taken out to the main track for her breeze. She proved quite a handful, at one point obliging Annemarie to lead her through the gap. “But that's good,” Joseph said afterwards. “That's her, that's what you like to see. She was just a bit fresh so it's good to have got that out of her.”
Intricately faces a rematch with Hydrangea (Ire) (Galileo), the Ballydoyle filly she denied by a nose when landing an upset success in the Moyglare S in September–a G1 breakthrough for both Joseph and Donnacha. “We weren't surprised,” Joseph said. “She had finished close behind those other fillies in the prep and Donnacha said she'd get closer again if he made more use of her. But obviously I never dreamt I might have a filly like this in my first year, and it was an unbelievable day. Whether this place will play to her strengths so well I don't know, she stays so well that she might prefer a stiffer track. But I don't think the ground will be an issue.”
Aidan was candidly delighted when the photo went against him at The Curragh and would love to see the boys do it again. But he suspects the odds are against them this time. “It's a big call for their filly, coming here,” he said. “She's probably not as streetwise as ours and I'd much rather be meeting her here than at Newmarket or The Curragh. But she'll learn a lot. We ran Qualify (Ire) (Fastnet Rock {Aus}) here a couple of years ago and she ran green and disappointing, but it did her a lot of good.”
So much so, in fact, that she proceeded to win the Oaks at 50-1 the following summer, in the same ownership as Intricately. Joseph finished down the field that day, having been hampered on a more fancied runner. By that stage he was reaching the end of his short but stellar career in the saddle and, at 6ft 1in, he is glad to return here in a position to have a proper steak.
“I'd be close to 11 stone now,” he said. “Riding, the weight was getting to me in the end–I was getting heavier and heavier, and making stupid mistakes in my last year. I was very lucky to have been able to ride some great horses, but I don't miss it at all. I suppose as a jockey you turn up on the day and ride your race. But this is so different, you're involved every minute–and I'm loving every minute.”
As for the mixed emotions stirred by filial competition, he shrugs. “With Dad we're not really in opposition at all,” he said. “We know in this game that every day is a new day, and to enjoy the good days and to move on from the bad. Because they'll be plenty of those.”
It is an approach instructive of the humility with which their father has set unprecedented standards not only for his son, but for trainers everywhere. Nonetheless Aidan's pride is clear, for once, in the flowering of a brood he has been bringing to the Breeders' Cup from their very youngest days, trailing their parents like a charming parade of ducks. “It's gas watching them working together, not just the boys but Ana and Sarah helping too,” he said. “There's nothing hidden between them. We always felt the only thing was for them to get on in there and go, because it's on the pitch that you learn. Joseph and Donnacha are both very focused but I suppose they've never known anything different from when they were very small. Certainly when the stalls open I wouldn't be expecting any favours. It's not for the faint-hearted out there.”
Aidan's strong hand in this race–he also runs Roly Poly (War Front), nose runner-up in the G1 Cheveley Park S–is expressive of the remarkable contribution made by fillies (13 Group 1 wins) to a year in which he has so far saddled a total of 21 winners at the highest level. The standard-bearer for his team here is duly the teak Found (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}), already runner-up in the G1 Qipco Champion S since leading home the Ballydoyle trifecta in the Arc. Having been pencilled in for the Classic, she ultimately joins Highland Reel (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) in the Turf–a race she won at Keeneland last year.
“The lads just felt a bit more comfortable going that way with her,” Aidan explained. “She's irreplaceable now and it just seemed a bit unfair to be pitching her into a race like that. What was pushing us towards the dirt is that she is tactically fast, a quick breaker and stays very well, and we'd had the Turf in mind a long time for Highland Reel, going a mile-and-a-half on fast ground. But there were so many unknowns and we've decided to keep her more in her comfort zone.”
“She's very well, anyway,” he added. “Ascot wasn't a tough race, they went slowly and it was really only a sprint up the straight. It wasn't a gruelling mile-and-a-quarter by any stretch, and she's a very hardy lady. Probably she's the most generous mare I've ever seen in my life. If you watch the Arc in slow motion, you see how she puts every sinew of her body into going forward. She gives it all so freely, it's really very unusual.”
Confined as he now is to the turf programme, Aidan will need an exceptional couple of days to give himself a chance of reaching Bobby Frankel's record of 25 Grade/Group 1 wins in a calendar year. But while both Found and Highland Reel would have the option of proceeding to Japan and/or Hong Kong, it scarcely seems necessary to add how little thought Aidan is giving to Frankel's record.
“We don't even think about it,” he stressed. “Any horse we run, in any race, it's only ever because it's right for them. Even when we ran the four colts in France on Sunday, that was only for them–to help them learn for next year. But it's unbelievable what Bobby Frankel did. We know how hard it is, and he was a great man.”
It was almost like an echo. Minutes earlier, talking to the same reporters on the same spot, Joseph had attempted to place his bid for history in due perspective. “You don't ever set out to break records,” he said. “All you ever set out to do is your best by every horse, every day.”
All there in the pedigree, then–just as it should be, at the Breeders' Cup.
Click here to listen to the TDN Podcast with Aidan O'Brien from earlier this week. Sponsored by Taylor Made.
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