All-time greatness is hovering in the wings at Keeneland, Kentucky where on Saturday the best horse from the U.S. and the best from Japan will at last meet in the head-to-head race the fates have so far denied us – barring late drama.
This time last year, Sovereignty stood supreme as the best three-year-old in North America, the favourite for the G1 Breeders’ Cup Classic, but set to face his toughest assignment against Japan’s best ever dirt track runner, the global star, Forever Young.
That race never happened. A fever three days before the race saw Sovereignty scratched. In his absence, Forever Young nailed a historic win, sealing his status as a Japanese legend. And that might have been that but for the competitive, sporting instincts of both horses’ owners – Godolphin’s head honcho, Sheikh Mohammed, and Susumu Fujita.
The right things were done, the stallion sheds of Darley and Shadai were put on hold, the horses raced on. That raised the prospect of a mouthwatering clash in the G1 Jockey Club Gold Cup at Belmont Park last month, especially after the U.S. Horse of the Year’s stunning win in the G1 Whitney, but Sovereignty developed a foot abscess and missed the race: Forever Young won easily without him there.
So, here we are: a four-year-old and a five-year-old, North America’s Horse of the Year versus Japan’s Horse of the Year in their mature, athletic primes, ready to battle. And that’s not all: lining up to take them on are the best of this year’s American three-year-olds, the G1 Kentucky Derby hero Golden Tempo and the G1 Preakness Stakes victor, Napoleon Solo; and let’s not forget Forever Young’s G1 Dubai World Cup nemesis Magnitude. It’s exactly how the sport is meant to be.
“I think Sovereignty is certainly the standout among the rivals,” Yahagi said Wednesday. “We have lost to Magnitude in Dubai as well, so I am particularly aware of these two.”
Yahagi said in the aftermath of last year’s Breeders’ Cup Classic win at Del Mar that the competitor in him wanted to face Sovereignty, to prove his horse is the better. Well, Sheikh Mohammed clearly felt similarly.
“Sovereignty didn’t have to prove anything this year, but Sheikh Mohammed and the Godolphin team want to win the Classic with this guy, that’s why they kept him racing this year,” the colt’s rider Junior Alvarado told Idol Horse, between the barn rows at Keeneland.
A year ago, Hall of Fame trainer Bill Mott had to stand before the media and break the shattering news that Sovereignty was out of the race. This time he and Godolphin are set to be double-handed, with G1 Pacific Classic winner Knightsbridge confirmed on Monday as also Classic-bound.
“I mean, it’s an amazing race and I have a lot of respect for all of them in there, but especially Forever Young: what a horse!” Mott told Idol Horse. “Just to travel the way he’s travelled around the world and run good everywhere he’s gone. He’s a very special horse.”
But so is Sovereignty: “He’s pretty special,” Mott continued. “A Derby winner, he won my ‘Triple Crown’, he won the Kentucky Derby, the Belmont, and the Travers, I mean I don’t know what more you could ask, and that was probably the highlight of his career and mine.”
If Sovereignty can win on Saturday, though, foiling Forever Young’s attempt at back-to-back wins, seeing off the best of his peers and the younger crowd coming after his champion’s title, that would be something, too. That would put him among the greats of this century.
“He’d go down in the history books, I suppose,” Mott mused. “He’s already pretty special, but that would kind of seal the deal. I think that’d be pretty memorable, if he was able to pull that off.”
Chad Summers is hoping to foil the clash between the big two with Napoleon Solo. The trainer and the colt’s somewhat mysterious owner Espoir USA Inc. surprised many observers when they opted to stretch to the 10 furlongs of the Classic rather than contest the G1 Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile.
“I think it’s a great race and we’ve got a Hall of Fame rider in John Velazquez that’s got all the confidence in the world in the horse, like I do. And we’ll see how the race unfolds,” Summers said.
“There’s no doubt that the easier race would have been the Dirt Mile. His one mile race was the most brilliant of his career, but we’re sportsmen at the end of the day. The ownership and I got together and we made a plan, and we just felt like this was the right time and the right place to do it. So, we’re gonna find out if we’re right or wrong.”
As for Sovereignty’s foot issue, Mott said: “It’s always a concern. The thing I can say about this is it didn’t happen the week before the race, it happened far enough out, it was well over six weeks ago and that gives us time to correct the situation.
“The bar shoe will come off race day. He’s still got it on there and doing good with it. It’s given him plenty of protection and we’ll take it off and put a normal racing plate on.”
As things stand, the scene is set for the race of the year, a clash of two champions, and contenders on the second line with the class to make things interesting.
This Week in Horse Racing History
October 26, 1996 was a big day in Breeders’ Cup history. Held at Woodbine in Canada, it was the first time the meet had been held outside the United States. To cap that occasion, Jenine Sahadi became the first woman to train the winner of a Breeders’ Cup race – Lit De Justice in the Breeders’ Cup Sprint.
Forever Young will this week attempt to become a back-to-back winner of the Breeders’ Cup Classic, but so far only one horse has achieved the feat and that was Tiznow on October 27, 2001. He narrowly saw off the brilliant turf champion Sakhee at Belmont Park, having defeated another European star Giant’s Causeway by a neck the year before.
Seabiscuit and War Admiral had their famous match race in the Pimlico Special on November 1, 1938. Seabiscuit won under George Woolf to take the US$15,000 prize.
Global Blackbook
A well-bred colt caught the eye at Kyoto on Sunday in an 1800m newcomers race, which has in the recent past been won by subsequent stars Epiphaneia, World Premiere and Shahryar.
Danon Cantabile was a ¥330 million purchase out of the 2024 Select Sale, being a son of the Japanese Triple Crown winner Contrail out of the Eclipse Award winning American mare Caledonia Road, winner of the G1 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies.
The colt, trained by Yuichi Fukunaga, settled back in the eight-runner field under Mirai Iwata before advancing early in the backstretch to press the leaders, three-wide. Nudged along on the home turn, Danon Cantabile quickened smartly into the straight and won by a length and three quarters.
Running on smartly in second place was the filly Neuerung, a daughter of the champion mare Chrono Genesis, while the running-on Golden Promise is by Contrail out of the Argentine Group 1 winner Joy Canela, and runs for the Forever Young connections of trainer Yoshito Yahagi and owner Susumu Fujita.
What’s Coming Up
Victoria Derby Day
Flemington, Australia, October 31
A maximum field of 16 is expected for the G1 Victoria Derby at Flemington. Vying for favouritism at the head of the market are G1 Spring Champion Stakes third and fourth Cormier and Stormy Marco, and the less-exposed True Rebel, winner of a Group 2 over 2040m at the course last time. Yulong-owned Quick Finish nailed a hat-trick when winning the G3 Ethereal Stakes at Caulfield last time and is a rare filly in the 2500m contest, which is in serious danger of being downgraded from its Group 1 status. ∎
