by Don Clippinger
The comeback race is always a big question, a mystery until the starting gate opens or the starter's flag drops. Dawalan (Fr) {Azamour (Ire)}, owner Irv Naylor's 2015 Eclipse Award winner as champion steeplechase horse, will attempt to answer that question Saturday in the GI Calvin Houghland Iroquois Hurdle S., at $200,000 the richest race on the National Steeplechase Association's spring calendar.
Coming back in a Grade I race is never easy, although Dawalan's task at Nashville's Percy Warner Park is less daunting since probable favorite Nichols Canyon (Ire) {Authorized (Ire)} sustained an injury while shipping to the U.S. from Ireland and was not entered for the three-mile race over National Fences.
Dawalan will be making his first start since November 2015, when he locked up the North American title in the G1 Marion duPont Scott Colonial Cup, his third start and second victory on U.S. shores. He was preparing to defend the title when he sustained a soft-tissue injury in a point-to-point prep race and missed the entire 2016 season.
Naylor, the champion owner in six of the last seven years, had Rawnaq (Ire) {Azamour (Ire)}, another mid-2015 import, in reserve. Rawnaq finished second, more than five lengths behind Dawalan, in the Colonial Cup, but he stepped up his game in 2016.
He turned back two Irish invaders, Shaneshill (Ire) {King's Theatre (Ire)} and Nichols Canyon, in an epic Calvin Houghland Iroquois and secured the Eclipse Award with a victory in the G1 Grand National at Far Hills, N.J.
Trained by Cyril Murphy, Dawalan will be in the best of hands. Jack Doyle, his jockey, has won the last two editions of the Iroquois and has come back from a serious injury last fall.
Even without Nichols Canyon in the lineup, Dawalan still faces a difficult task. Chief among his challengers is Bruton Street-US's Scorpiancer (Ire) {Scorpion (Ire)}, who finished fourth in last year's Iroquois. Scorpiancer moved forward in subsequent months and collected his first Grade I victory in Belmont Park's Lonesome Glory Handicap last September.
Scorpiancer started his 2017 campaign with a thoroughly professional victory in the G3 Temple Gwathmey Handicap in Virginia. He too is in good hands. Trained by Jack Fisher, Scorpiancer will be ridden by Sean McDermott.
Fisher, the champion steeplechase trainer for the last five years, is responsible for half of the six-horse Calvin Houghland Iroquois field. Also under his care are Mr. Hot Stuff (Tiznow), a Grade I winner and former Triple Crown competitor, and Hinterland (GB) (Poliglote {GB}).
Saturday's winner will be eligible to pursue the TVV Capital Iroquois-Cheltenham Challenge, which offers $500,000 to the horse who wins the Nashville race and the Cheltenham Festival's G1 Stayers' Hurdle in the same 12 months.
While preparing for the Stayers' Hurdle, Rawnaq sustained an injury that will keep him out of action this year. Nichols Canyon won the Stayers' Hurdle in March, and trainer Willie Mullins had the bonus money in his sights when Nichols Canyon sustained his shipping injury.
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