Jet Propelled

Having turned 12,000 guineas into £1.3 million in less than eight months, Jet Setting (Ire) (Fast Company {Ire}) arrives at Royal Ascot in the position of favourite for the G1 Coronation S., which would have been laughable as she left Richard Hannon's stable still a maiden after four starts in the autumn. As she was transported to the sales, the bay had last been seen finishing eighth at 25-1 behind Nemoralia (More Than Ready) in a Doncaster nursery in September, and it is a measure of her scarcely believable rise that she now usurps that filly in the betting for this prize. Adrian Keatley's miracle worker managed to temporarily halt the seemingly unstoppable winning sequence of Minding (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) in the G1 Irish 1000 Guineas at The Curragh May 22, and in his post-Oaks interview Michael Tabor admitted to some bewilderment that it had actually happened. While that dual Classic winner did hit her head in the stalls and may have been a touch flat in Kildare, everything else was soundly beaten, which suggests the China Horse Club's latest purchase is the real deal. “It's a great story for Irish racing,” Keatley said of the centrepiece of the Goffs London Sale. “We are dominated by a couple of big names over here in Ireland, so it's good for racing to have a filly like her. She's my first Royal Ascot runner and it is important for me not to get too excited about it all. While we were second or third favourite for the Irish Guineas, we were virtually untalked about but now she is favourite and running for her new owners, who we are very privileged to have so there is a lot more pressure. We think she's probably in better form than before the Irish Guineas.” With the ground also in her favour and against some of her chief rivals, all the boxes are ticked, but her trainer believes she is no one-trick pony. “Everybody says she's a mudlark, but I don't think she needs soft ground, she just doesn't want firm ground,” he added. “She'd had an interrupted preparation before [her ninth-place finish in] the English Guineas. She had an abscess on her foot, which meant she had missed a lot of work so perhaps it wasn't the ground there.”

Since her Doncaster success, Terry Allan, James Lovat and Charles Pigram's Nemoralia has gone from strength to strength and followed a second in the GI Frizette S. at Belmont in October with a third in the GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf at Keeneland the following month. Her explosive re-introduction in York's Listed Michael Seely Memorial S. over a mile May 13 came on fast ground and there is no doubt that the softening of the surface has played against her. “Barring this weather, everything is perfect. She is ready,” trainer Jeremy Noseda said. “If anyone had asked me how I'd wanted to arrive at the race, she is everything I could have wanted and more. The filly is in such great order. The Coronation Stakes has been the plan since last November and unless there is a deluge and it turns into a quagmire, I feel we've got to give it a go and take our chance. I've watched the race at the Breeders' Cup time and time again and visually you can't see her struggling on the [yielding] ground.”

Two of the last five winners of this came via the G1 Poule d'Essai des Pouliches and that form is represented this time by Qemah (Ire) (Danehill Dancer {Ire}). Al Shaqab Racing's G3 Prix de la Grotte winner was third behind the fellow Rouget-trained La Cressonniere (Fr) (Le Havre {Ire}) and Abdullah Saeed Al Naboodah's Nathra (Ire) (Iffraaj {GB}) over Deauville's straight mile May 15, where Susan Magnier's Alice Springs (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) was a disappointing seventh having been third in the G1 1000 Guineas at Newmarket a fortnight earlier. Harry Herbert, racing manager for Al Shaqab Racing, said of Qemah, “She has been in very good form since that run and we always felt that a faster pace in the Coronation S. would suit her better.”