Jessica Harrington is throwing down the gauntlet to Germany’s best on Sunday when she sends Trevaunance to contest Europe’s sole Group One weekend prize.
After last weekend’s glut of top-flight competition, including the Irish Champions Festival, the Preis Von Europa in Cologne has the Group One stage to itself.
The €155,000 mile-and-a-half contest has never been won by an Irish-trained horse in its 61-year history, but no one’s come closer than Harrington who saddled Trevaunance to finish runner-up behind India last year.
Shane Foley will again team up with the well-travelled mare in a race due off at 1.00pm Irish time.
The bird-shaped obsession that drives James Crombie, one of Ireland’s best sports photographers
Vintage Durkan clash in prospect at star studded ‘Premiere Weekend’ in Punchestown
Irish star Auguste Rodin to receive historic retirement ceremony after his final race in Japan Cup
Racing’s reaction to coverage of Cheltenham deaths shows worrying insecurity about nature of the sport
Godolphin’s 2022 winner Rebel’s Romance is back again and the fourth top-rated turf horse in the world will be ridden by William Buick, while the six-runner field also includes this year’s German Derby and Oaks winners, Palladium and Erle.
Trevaunance hasn’t won a race in more than two years but showed something like her best form in Deauville last time when runner-up to Aventure. The latter was runner-up to Bluestocking in last weekend’s Prix Vermeille.
Joseph O’Brien’s Al Riffa secured Group One success in Germany last month when landing the Grosser Preis Von Berlin.
Other Irish international interest on Sunday come from O’Brien’s Tipperary maiden winner Dignam who contests the nine-furlong Group Three Prix De Conde (1.33) at Chantilly. Mickael Barzalona rides the colt.
At home, Sunday sees the start of the 166th Listowel Harvest Festival with more than 90,000 expected to attend over the six days.
Wednesday’s €200,000 Guinness Kerry National is the feature event although Ryan Moore’s first visit to the track on Tuesday to ride for Aidan O’Brien is also being eagerly anticipated.
The north Kerry track hosted local boy Oisín Murphy for the first time last year after hopes that Frankie Dettori might ride were dashed in an apparent disagreement over appearance money.
Last year’s winner Desertmore House is among 31 entries still left in the Kerry National with the top-class Fakir D’ooudairies topweight.
The Real Whacker, a Grade One winner at the 2023 Cheltenham festival, is also still in the mix to line up for his trainer, Patrick Neville, originally from Limerick.
Prominent in ante-post betting lists for the National is Zanahiyr whose trainer Gordon Elliott has twice before won the race and could have up to six runners this time.
“We’ll run Zanahiyr, Chemical Energy and Duffle Coat. The three of them all ran well in the Galway Plate,” he said on Friday. “The Goffer will be going there fresh. He likes a bit of nice ground, and he could be dangerous. He’s one I’d be looking forward to.”
Terrestrial TV coverage of Listowel begins on Monday on TG4 who will show all six remaining days.
The festival begins with a three-year-old hurdle on Sunday where Elliott introduces Zanahiyr’s half-sister Zaynab to jumping.
The filly has won twice at the Curragh this year and wasn’t disgraced when lining up at Royal Ascot. With Sam Ewing on board, she gets plenty weight from the experienced topweight, Teriferma.
Henry De Bromhead has a couple of jumps runners to begin the week at Listowel but before that will hope to pick up a valuable Group Three on the flat in Ayr.
Former British champion jockey Jim Crowley has been booked for Navan maiden winner Town And Country in the Firth Of Clyde Stakes over six furlongs.
Another Irish two-year-old filly in the line-up is Fozzy Stacks’s Grande Marques, also a winner at Navan on her last start. Danny Tudhope rides her in a race won last year by Johnny Murtagh’s Prime Art.
Ireland’s Group Three highlight on Saturday is Gowran’s Denny Cordell/Lanwades Studs Stakes where Joseph O’Brien has half the dozen-strong field.
Dylan Browne McMonagle has opted for Uluru in a wide-open contest that also includes the Killarney winner One Look and Dermot Weld’s Azada.
Nothing this weekend though is likely to compete in the “Curio” Stakes with Friday’s gallop by the Derby winner City Of Troy at the Southwell all-weather circuit.
After routinely picking up four inferior stable companions in a mile workout, and pushed out through the line by Ryan Moore, the colt acclaimed by Aidan O’Brien as the best he’s trained remains a general 5/2 favourite for the Breeders’ Cup Classic on dirt at Del Mar in November.
The quintet broke from US-type starting stalls as O’Brien used the Tapeta surface to help his turf adapt to the dirt challenge facing him at the Breeders’ Cup.
“He achieved what the objective was, and it’s about six weeks now [to Del Mar],” Moore reported.
“He’s an unusual horse and he showed how good he is at York. If he can transfer that level of ability to the dirt, then you’d like to think he’d be in the mix,” he added.
