Blast From The Past: Dubai World Cup

‘Yaazer’ was the original name for a Sheikh Mohammed-owned colt who, once he began to sparkle on the gallops as an unraced two-year-old, was given a different identity - and with it a date with destiny in the first Dubai World Cup of the new millennium. The renamed Dubai Millennium duly made it to Nad Al Sheba as a four-year-old in 2000, by which time he had won seven of his eight starts. The only blemish on his record had come in the Derby when pulling too hard, but otherwise his wins at three had included Group 1 victories over a mile in the Prix Jacques le Marois and the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes.

Dubai Millennium warmed up for the Dubai World Cup by breaking the track record on his dirt debut in a listed race at Nad Al Sheba just over three weeks beforehand and lined up against twelve rivals in the world’s most valuable race (worth £2,286,427 to the winner). The field included horses from the USA, Hong Kong, Japan and Saudi Arabia, besides a couple from Britain (Running Stag and Lear Spear) and two other stable-companions representing Godolphin and Saeed bin Suroor.

The most dangerous of Dubai Millennium’s rivals appeared to be the US-trained six-year-old Behrens who had disappointed when favourite for the Breeders’ Cup Classic but had since added another Grade 1 to his record in the Gulfstream Park Handicap the previous month. But soon after the stalls opened, dangers proved non-existent for Frankie Dettori and Dubai Millennium as Racehorses described:

‘Dubai Millennium went to the front inside the first furlong, eased across to the rail from his outside draw, and was thereafter in a class of his own. It was a rout, and the ease with which Dubai Millennium administered it was a cause for disbelief. Racing apparently well within himself until the straight, he had the rest struggling to keep up well before that point and then sprinted away once in line for home. Behrens, Running Stag and Saint’s Honor had been within two lengths of him off the final turn, three furlongs out, but Dubai Millennium was well clear over the last furlong and a half, and what was supposed to be a race had turned into a ceremony of acclamation…

‘At the post, in the midst of Dettori’s energetic celebrations, Dubai Millennium held an official winning margin of six lengths over Behrens, who had himself drawn five and a half clear of Public Purse and Puerto Madero. In our estimation, these distances were more like seven lengths and six and a half. Either way, and why mince words, the winner had put on a display of sheer brilliance.’

Dubai Millennium had lowered the track record again, and on the Timeform scale that ‘sheer brilliance’ equated to a rating of 140, a mark which only Frankel (147) has bettered since. The Breeders’ Cup Classic was announced as Dubai Millennium’s main target later in the year, but he managed only one more run, and win (in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes back on turf at Royal Ascot) before a fractured leg ended his racing career. His subsequent stud innings proved sadly short-lived too, but top sire Dubawi figured among Dubai Millennium’s only crop of foals.

Dubawi is the sire of Mubtaahij, last year’s Dubai World Cup runner-up, who’ll be bidding to go one better this year, though in Arrogate he faces a rival with the potential to be the best Dubai World Cup winner since Dubai Millennium himself.