AIDAN O'BRIFN'S ambitious European Group One double attempt yesterday went down in flames, with Orange Jasmine (Seamus Hefferman) doing best by taking fifth to Nicole Pharly (Frankie Dettori), beaten almost six lengths, in the £130,832 Oaks d'Italia (1m 3f) in Milan.

O'Brien's Family Tradition ran disappointingly to be last to Brilliance in the £56,128 Prix Saint-Alary (10f) at Longchamp. The filly led to the quarter-mile pole before being beaten a little over 12 lengths.

Jockey Cash Asmussen said: "I rode the filly to orders but basically she wasn't good enough in this type of class in this type (very soft) of around."

After Saturday, Silver Charm is on course to become the first American Triple Crown winner since Affirmed in 1978 after gaining the day in a pulsating finish to the Preakness Stakes at Pimlico.

In a stirring stretch duel, Silver Charm outbattled Free House by a head, with the fast-closing Captain Bodgit, rallying furiously from off the pace, a similar margin further back.

Captain Bodgit was unquestionably the unlucky horse of the race and he could well ruin Silver Charm's Triple Crown party over the mile and a half of the Belmont Stakes next month.

Richard Hannon yesterday took the wraps off the best of his early two-year-olds when Bold Edge made an impressive winning debut at Newbury.

Responsible for eight individual juvenile winners already this campaign, Bold Edge became his ninth with the length and three-quarter defeat of Anvil.

Royal Ascot is the target for many of Hannon's winners but Bold Edge, brother of the speedy Brave Edge, jumped ahead of them with this win for owner and breeder Lady Whent.

"He's the best two-year-old I've got at the moment. We've done very little with him but I put him in a gallop the other day and he went right off the end. We've got one lovely horse and he hasn't even come in his coat."