Al Maktoum Challenge

Twelve months on from having completed a Bhupat Seemar one-two finish, Deva Racing's Imperial Emperor (Dubawi) put his stablemate and 2025 winner Walk of Stars (Dubawi) to the sword approaching the final 400 metres of Friday's G1 Al Maktoum Challenge at Meydan and reported home a comfortable winner to punch his ticket to the G1 Dubai World Cup over an extra 100 metres in a couple months' time. In the process, the 6-year-old has become the 64th worldwide elite-level winner for his spectacular sire. Exiting a victory over Commissioner King...

Previously better known for his inability to finish off his races,  Walk of Stars (GB) (Dubawi {Ire}) seems to have put those bad habits behind him, as he well and truly stamped his authority on Friday's G1 Al Maktoum Challenge at Meydan, leading home a 1-2 finish for the Bhupat Seemar yard and his legendary sire. Runner-up in last year's G2 Godolphin Mile after looking home free, Walk of Stars was second on seasonal reappearance in the Listed Dubai Creek Mile Nov. 22, but was sent straight into the lead...

DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES -- The final day of the Keeneland September Sale is one where you blink and you miss it. It's a leaner session to begin with numbers-wise and the action is fast....as in, lightning fast. It's a real meat-and-potatoes sort of way to wrap up two exhausting weeks of trade. But, on rare occasions, there are diamonds in the rough to be found. Just ask Nadir Khassanov and while you're at it, talk to the people at Mulholland Springs. On Friday, Sept. 24, 2021, Khassanov, a bloodstock...

Kabirkhan (California Chrome) continued a most improbable fairy-tale run at the Dubai Racing Carnival, as he raced prominently following a bit of a sluggish dispatch and powered home late to easily take out Friday's US$1-million G1 Al Maktoum Challenge at Meydan. The chestnut with a big white blaze--eerily reminiscent of his G1 Dubai World Cup-winning sire--was returning just a fortnight after annexing a 2000-metre handicap, and for all intents and purposes forced the hand of trainer Doug Watson. After racing for next to no prize-money while winning eight of nine...

Glitters To Shine On Super Saturday Lord Glitters (Fr) (Whipper) may be a former G1 Queen Anne S. winner, but at age nine he has revamped himself as a Middle Eastern star, and he lines up as one of the highlight horses of Super Saturday in the G1 Jebel Hatta S. It has been almost three years since the grey visited a winner's enclosure in Europe, but in the meantime Lord Glitters has won four black-type races in the Gulf region, including last year's edition of this race, the G3...

GISW Hot Rod Charlie Preps For The Dubai World Cup Doug O'Neill's Grade I winner Hot Rod Charlie (Oxbow), one of five runners for the GI Kentucky Derby-winning trainer on Meydan's Dubai World Cup Carnival Friday card, is easily the highest-rated horse to compete on the day, and he gains the services of William Buick, Godolphin being without a runner in the G2 Al Maktoum Challenge Round 2. After finishing second at 100-1 in the 2020 GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile, Hot Rod Charlie franked that form to be one of...

A packed slate of seven pattern races is set for Meydan's 'Super Saturday' card for aspirants to the Dubai World Cup races on Mar. 27, and headlining the card is the G1 Al Maktoum Challenge R3 over the course and distance of the $12-million G1 Dubai World Cup. Last-out group winners Salute The Soldier (Ger) (Sepoy {Aus}) and Secret Ambition (GB) (Exceed and Excel {Aus}) are the headliners, but potential distance limitations for the pair of them perhaps levels the playing field. The 6-year-old Salute The Soldier went the furthest...

Last year's G3 Autumn S. winner Military March (GB) (New Approach {Ire}), a leading fancy for the G1 Investec Derby before meeting with a setback in the lead-up to the race, will follow a similar path over the winter to his Saeed bin Suroor stablemate Benbatl (GB) (Dubawi {Ire}), the trainer said. Military March, last seen finishing fourth in the G1 2000 Guineas on June 6, is training towards an autumn return in Europe and will later target dirt races in Dubai. "Military March is back in light training," bin...