SANDOWN PARK, ENGLAND // It is on international racing weekends like these that you have got to thank small mercies you live in the UAE.
Almost everywhere you look over the next two days there is action at the highest level, and each of the meetings feature either a horse that has run in Dubai or has owners or connections who have the deepest roots in the Emirates.
Mike de Kock kicks off proceedings at Greyville in South Africa as he goes in search of a fifth Durban July, South Africa’s premier all-ages event.
The Dubai World Cup Carnival’s leading international trainer saddles the filly Espumanti, ridden by Anthony Delpech, while trainer Sean Tarry, a visitor to Dubai during the racing season, bids to follow up his July wins with Heavy Metal and Pomodoro in the past two years with Whiteline Fever.
Half an hour later, the Eclipse Stakes at Sandown features The Fugue and Mukhadram, two Dubai World Cup night runners.
In America late Saturday night the inaugural Belmont Derby Invitational will be contested by UAE Derby winner Toast Of New York.
For good measure, his travelling companion from England, Side Glance, will be in action on Sunday when the dual Dubai World Cup fourth takes his chance in the United Nations Stakes at Monmouth Park.
Of all the races, it is the Eclipse that pulls together the most international form lines. The Fugue bids to embroider her scorching performance in the Prince Of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot last month and confirm her superiority over Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid’s Mukhadram.
The Fugue was injured at Meydan in the Dubai Duty Free on World Cup night in March, but Mukhadram ran the race of his life to finish second in the World Cup.
Thanks largely to The Fugue’s victory at the Royal Meeting the mount of William Buick is widely considered the overwhelming favourite to land her fifth success at the highest level.
She could be hard pressed by Night Of Thunder, the English 2,000 Guineas winner owned by Saeed Manana, the UAE businessman.
Night Of Thunder was no match for Kingman in the St James’s Palace Stakes at Royal Ascot and to avoid another clash with his conqueror has been forced to take a step up in distance to 2,000 metres and takes on his elders for the first time.
It will be an intriguing test and one that sees Godolphin’s True Story finally get the good-to-firm going that Keiren Fallon and Saeed bin Suroor have been desperately seeking ever since he put seven lengths between him and the Fielden Stakes field at Newmarket in April.
Kingston Hill is another with strong claims after his second in the English Derby, but he will be ridden this time by Frankie Dettori because fellow Italian Andrea Atzeni is required to ride at Haydock by Sheikh Mohammed Obaid.
When you add in Group 1 winners War Command and Verrazano, both trained by Aidan O’Brien, and Jim Bolger’s 2013 Irish Derby winner Trading Leather, the Eclipse offers a heady mix.
“It is a very good race in depth, in numbers, whichever way you look at it,” Richard Hannon, Night Of Thunder’s trainer, said yesterday. “We have to make a man of him some day and we are delighted to be taking part in it.
“The best way for us to avoid Kingman is by staying at a mile and a quarter (2,000m).”
With the World Cup and Wimbledon also in action, sport will come thick and fast throughout this afternoon and tonight. Blink and you will miss it.
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