Japan

The popular Shergar Cup jockeys' competition is staged at Ascot on Saturday, and Hayley Turner, captain of the Girls Team, is looking forward to defending her Silver Saddle crown for leading rider at the fixture as well as the team title. "I love it, it's like waiting for Christmas," Turner told Sky Sports News. "I just enjoy it so much and I don't know why, it's just something a bit different and it's good fun. I had a good year last year and having the team event, while we ride...

Late last month Pat Keogh, chief executive officer at Leopardstown since 2011, took up the same position at The Curragh upon the resignation of Derek McGrath. The fast nature of that change over means that Keogh will slowly phase out of his Leopardstown role, presiding over both racecourses until the conclusion of Longines Irish Champions Weekend on Sept. 14 and 15. It is no secret that the redeveloped Curragh Racecourse, unveiled after three years of construction this spring, has undergone some growing pains which have already been addressed by racecourse...

Aidan O'Brien has set his sights on winning the G1 Ladbrokes Cox Plate for a second time, with Derby hero Anthony Van Dyck (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) and Royal Ascot victor Circus Maximus (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) among his 11 initial entries for the Australian feature. O'Brien sent Adelaide (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) to win the 2014 renewal, with the Moonee Valley Group 1 subsequently dominated by Chris Waller's superstar Winx (Aus) (Street Cry {Ire}), a record four-times winner before her retirement earlier this year. No stranger to competing in Australia, O'Brien has...

There is more than a hand's difference in height between Deirdre (Jpn) (Harbinger {GB}) and Love So Deep (Jpn) (Deep Impact {Jpn}) but what the diminutive Love So Deep lacks in stature she makes up for in feistiness, while the regal Deirdre studies those around her with her calm, kind eye. By Monday morning the air of jubilation surrounding the two fillies had still not dissipated at Abington Place where each has been prepared this summer. The stable, once home to Harry Wragg and then his son Geoff and now...

In this continuing series, Alan Carasso takes a look ahead at US-bred and/or conceived runners entered for the upcoming weekend at the tracks on the Japan Racing Association circuit, with a focus on pedigree and/or performance in the sales ring. Here are the horses of interest for this weekend running at Kokura, Niigata and Sapporo Racecourses: Saturday, August 3, 2019 4th-KOK, ¥9,550,000 ($88k), Maiden, 3yo, 1700m MONUMENT KING (c, 3, Creative Cause--Overvalued, by Forest Grove) cost Shadai Farm $500K at Keeneland September in 2017, easily the most expensive of his...

In the week that Japan lost Deep Impact (Jpn), there was a piece of consolation as the country's Deirdre (Jpn) (Harbinger {GB}) swooped late to cause an upset in Thursday's G1 Qatar Nassau S. at Goodwood. Seemingly shy of her best so far this season, Toji Morita's 5-year-old who had captured the 2017 Shuka Sho was 20-1 taking on the Classic generation but had an ideal pace scenario settled towards the rear as the free-running Mehdaayih (GB) (Frankel {GB}) tanked along in front under Frankie Dettori. That rival looked to...

Given that his own sire had overcome a pretty mediocre family to become no less potent, it might seem misplaced to insist on due credit for the other genetic contributors to the legacy of Deep Impact (Jpn). On the face of it, after all, the career of Sunday Silence might suggest that the bull--in his case, Halo--really can be more than half the herd. For some of us, however, even the most successful sire-line can only ever be one strand in a complex mesh--and, as such, there will always be...

Barry K. Schwartz's Japan (Medaglia d'Oro) displayed so much promise in his early training that former conditioner Mike Hushion thought he would be a GI Belmont S. contender. While the big, late-developing colt did not make it to the Test of a Champion, he was an impressive winner of the Easy Goer S. earlier that day, stamping his ticket to Saturday's GII Jim Dandy S. at Saratoga. (Video) "We were very high on him from the start," Schwartz said. "Mike Hushion actually thought he might be a Belmont horse if...