Weekly Wrap: Buried treasure

From £3m worth of comic books to £4m worth of a Van Gough original, as have been discovered in the last decade, it can pay to clean out the attic. The most valuable commodities are sometimes hidden away, unnoticed and unremarked, and the more resplendent the house the more the chance of some tucked-away treasure.

Racing’s house couldn’t have been much more resplendent in the last week, like a magical museum of equine excellence, from the spectacle of speed by Battaash to the electrifying exhibition by Enable and the callow class of Clemmie. All of those, and more, are appraised and valued by our two-part Ratings Update, but if there was ever a week at which to take a metal detector, to scour beneath the surface, then this was it.

Let’s look, therefore, at those horses who didn’t make a keynote speech but certainly had a few words to say away from the overcrowded main stage at racing’s rocking festival last week.

1. TAAREEF (Jean-Claude Rouget). Outshone at the milers meeting by Beat The Bank, and outcast at the family gathering by Roaring Lion, Taareef could feel a little aggrieved at having so little love for clinically disposing of a Group 2 field in the Prix Dollar at Longchamp on Saturday.

Roaring Lion was the Kitten’s (pride and) Joy that generated all the paternal praise, while Beat The Bank has understandably been initiated as the new nemesis for Ribchester after his latest jump in the Joel, but Taareef has already given Ribchester a grilling in last month’s Prix du Moulin, pushing him to ¾ length, despite some lane crossing in the finish. If Taareef comes to Ascot, he won’t be the 10/1 that he currently is.

2. WAR DECREE (Aidan O’Brien). This is the jumbo jet that that keeps getting to the point of take-off only to stall at the last second, but once again it rolled thunderously down the Dundalk runway last Friday, and the flight plan is transatlantic.

He spent a long time in Ballydoyle’s historical hangar after the French Derby (fifth), when worked on by the meticulous mechanics, and the fine-tuning looks to have made a decisive difference from the way he powered past Abingdon and co in the Group 3 Diamond Stakes. The precarious dots to be joined – that he’s by War Front and took to the artificial surface at Dundalk like the proverbial ‘d’ to ‘w’ – even hint at a wild swing at the Classic itself, also maybe more his trip than the Turf or the Mile. Whichever Grade 1 he finds himself, his rating isn’t going to worry anyone, but his profile will, as there’s a storm brewing.

3. POLYDREAM (Freddie Head). When the starry-eyed turn wide-eyed. That was the story for the hyped-up Polydream, who had a touch of stage fright at Chantilly, after breezing through her rehearsals at Chantilly.

Under the circumstances, under restraint and under a misapprehension of how easy racing is, Polydream grabbing second in the Marcel Boussac was more positive than negative, a harsh lesson learned, all part of the Guineas graduation, for which odds of 20/1 (for Newmarket) undersells her potential, even after Clemmie and Happily did what they did last weekend.

4. GAVOTA (Roger Charlton). At 33/1, Gavota is an even smaller blip on the Guineas radar than Polydream, but what was effectively her first trial at least ensured a second one will come next spring, as she did wonders to get third in the Rockfel.

There was something of the Polydream about her in the sense that two straightforward wins left her on the undercooked side, finding the company almost as much of a shock to the system as the Dip (leapt up in protest), not up to the job at her stage, but the overtime work she put in to greatly reduce the deficit by the line strongly suggests that there’s a Group-class filly in her just bursting to get out.

5. BOLT D’ORO (Mick Ruis, USA). No sooner does one trailblazing Bolt leave the athletic stage than another one speeds his way in. More than ever, racing is a global game, and the digital word gets around, delayed this week by the focus on the feast in Europe, but the noteworthy news from afar is that a new star set a new bar amongst the American two-year-olds.

It was a sight to behold when Bolt d’Oro let rip in the straight in the Grade 1 Frontrunner Stakes at Santa Anita on Saturday night, galloping 7¾ lengths clear of his breathless rivals and galloping to the top of the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile betting, which will effectively be a homecoming for him, already twice a winner at Del Mar. American Pharoah and Arrogate have been the last two giants of US racing, and after ‘A’ comes ‘B’.

Fresh from an embarrassing blank on their biggest day, the French are massing outside of Newmarket on a revenge mission, intent on plundering the Sun Chariot prize. The raiding party comprises their finest generals, namely Fabre, Head and Rouget, bringing the cavalry of Usherette, Siyoushake and Qemah respectively.

The most decorated of them, Qemah, has got 3¼ lengths to make up on Persuasive from the Matron, and Usherette hasn’t hit the same heights this year as 2016, needing to dip down to listed level to win last time. On the other hand, Siyoushake’s stock is still rising, beating all bar the enterprisingly-ridden Ajman Princess in the Group 1 Prix Jean Romanet, kept fresh since for this, in a better place now than when fourth in it last year, and she may be the sharpest of the French weapons despite the market having her as the outsider of those three.

Furthermore, Fabre is also attacking Ascot via Waldgeist in the Cumberland Lodge. At the time, his fourth in the Irish Derby seemed a little underwhelming, but subsequent significant successes for Capri and Cracksman have shone a brighter reflective light on Waldgeist’s performance in fourth that day, and, with the weight-for-age of his unconvincing elders in this field, he’s probably an odds-on shot.