The US star Fierceness has emerged as perhaps the biggest danger to City Of Troy’s chance of pulling off a landmark Breeders’ Cup Classic success in November.
Fierceness came out on top when many of the best of America’s top dirt performers clashed in Saturday night’s Travers Stakes at Saratoga, a race that had originally been on City Of Troy’s agenda earlier this season.
The Todd Pletcher-trained star was well in command of his male rivals but was all out to hold off the filly Thorpedo Anna by a head.
She is unlikely to take the $7 million Classic option when the $33 million Breeders’ Cup rolls into Del Mar on November 1st-2nd, more likely instead to stick to her sex in the Distaff.
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However, Fierceness is on course for a mouth-watering clash with City Of Troy in America’s most valuable race. He is a 5/1 second favourite in ante-post lists on his side of the Atlantic, a point shorter than the horse acclaimed by Aidan O’Brien as the best he has trained.
On the back of his Juddmonte International victory at York last week, City Of Troy won’t race again before trying to secure his Coolmore ownership a long sought-after first Classic success.
However, O’Brien is prepared to take him back to Britain for some experience on an all-weather surface there, a tactic he has used in the past with horses being readied to try dirt.
“The lads [owners]) are talking about going for the Classic with him and if he’s going for the Classic, we’ll have to give him the best preparation we can give him over here.
“That will probably mean going to Southwell or one of those tracks. He’ll have to get on a plane as he needs to travel and have a nice workout somewhere.
“Hopefully, we’ll prepare him the best we can to give him the chance to run his best race in America. It’s a tall order but we’ll always dream, and it will be exciting to see,” he said.
The champion trainer hasn’t ruled out last week’s Great Voltiguer winner Los Angeles from a tilt at next month’s Irish Champion Stakes where he could line up alongside stable companions Auguste Rodin and Luxembourg.
“He could go to either the St Leger or the Irish Champion Stakes. Obviously if he’s going to the Arc, he could go for the Irish Champion Stakes,” O’Brien said of the Irish Derby hero.
“We’ll see what the ground is going to be like at Doncaster and there are three other horses that could run in the St Leger if he [Los Angeles] didn’t run there. He seems to have come out of the race [in York] well. We’ll see what happens over the next couple of weeks,” he added.
A UK bank holiday Monday sees afternoon action in Downpatrick alongside another jumping programme in Ballinrobe later in the evening.
Paddy Twomey takes Seo Linn back to the Mayo track for another bumper, following her promising debut there in May. That experience could prove crucial against some interesting newcomers in the finale.
