Arc Trials: What's the verdict?

With less than a month until Europe’s richest race, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe (October 1^st), Sunday sees an important meeting at Chantilly featuring the three Arc trials run over the same course and distance as the big race itself three weeks later. This will be the second year that the Arc, and its trials, will be run at Chantilly before they return to their traditional home of Longchamp in 2018 when that track’s redevelopment is completed. 

The Arc trials comprise:

• The Prix Vermeille, a Group 1 for fillies and mares of all ages (formerly for three-year-old fillies only)
• The Prix Niel, a Group 2 for three-year-old colts (also open to fillies, but not geldings)
• The Prix Foy, a Group 2 for four-year-olds and upwards of both sexes (again, not open to geldings)

There are no penalties for Group 1 winners in either the Niel or the Foy.

Taking the last thirty runnings of the Arc, the race has been won by twenty three-year-olds compared with only ten older horses. As that would suggest, the trial for older horses, the Prix Foy, has been the least informative of the three trials. In fact, you have to go back to 1984 (Sagace) for the last Foy winner to follow up in the Arc, while the last Arc winner to have run in the Foy beforehand was Subotica who finished second in 1992. More recently, the Japanese horse Orfevre won the Foy before both his attempts at the Arc in 2012 and 2013, finishing runner-up on both occasions and going down by a neck in a race he really should have won on the first occasion.

There will be added interest to this Sunday’s Prix Foy by the first appearance in Europe of the latest Japanese challenger for the Arc, Satono Diamond, who is prominent in the Arc betting behind hot favourite Enable. Satono Diamond will be having his first start since finishing third in a Group 1 in Japan at the end of April. While the Japanese are still awaiting a first success in the Arc, they have a better record in the Arc trials; as well as Orfevre’s wins in the Foy, two more Japanese Derby winners, Kizuna and (last year) Makahiki, have won the Prix Niel (Satono Diamond was beaten a nose by Makahiki in last year’s Japanese Derby).

So what about the Prix Niel as an Arc trial? Historically, at least, the Niel has been an excellent pointer to the Arc and when Rail Link was successful in both races in 2006 he became the ninth colt in twenty years to complete the double in the same year. Rail Link was a record seventh Arc winner for his trainer Andre Fabre, six of those winners being three-year-olds who had all been prepped in the Niel beforehand (Fabre’s only older Arc winner was the aforementioned Subotica who also won the Niel the year before but was beaten in his first Arc attempt as a three-year-old). All of Fabre’s three-year-old Arc winners won the Niel except for Peintre Celebre who was an unlucky second. Fabre’s most recent Niel winner was New Bay in 2015 who went on to finish third in the Arc.

However, no Niel winner has been successful in the Arc in the ten runnings since Rail Link which certainly takes the gloss of the race’s once well-deserved reputation as the best Arc trial. It remains to be seen whether this year’s Niel will throw up a serious challenger to Enable as her stable-companion Cracksman, a possible runner on Sunday, may be aimed by John Gosden at the Champion Stakes instead. On the other hand, a convincing win at the weekend might make the Arc a tempting prospect for connections who were successful two years ago with Golden Horn.

Golden Horn became the third Derby winner to win the Arc in the last ten years after Sea The Stars and Workforce. But recent runnings of the Arc have made it a fillies’ race again, with Zarkava, Danedream, Solemia, Treve (twice) and last year’s winner Found all successful since 2008. That’s a remarkable turnaround in fortunes given that Zarkava had been the first female winner for fifteen years when Sea The Stars’ dam Urban Sea won in 1993. The current run of success for fillies is reminiscent of the period 1974-1982 during which they won six Arcs.

As a result, of the three races, the Prix Vermeille has the best recent record as an Arc trial, providing the Arc winner on four occasions in the last ten years. Zarkava and Treve (as a three-year-old) won both races, while shock winner Solemia, who pipped Orfevre in 2012, was third in the Vermeille beforehand and Treve was only fourth (trying to come from last in the most slowly-run of the three trials that year) before gaining her repeat win at four. Treve did win the Vermeille again as a five-year-old before her unsuccessful bid to win a record third Arc.

Having said that, the outcome of this year’s Vermeille seems unlikely to make much of an impact on the Arc market. The first two home from last year’s Vermeille, Left Hand and Endless Time, could re-oppose on Sunday, but they fought out a weak renewal twelve months ago, with Left Hand going on to finish well down the field in the Arc.

But there’s another race elsewhere this weekend, which, whilst not an Arc trial in name, has the impressive record of providing four of the last ten Arc winners. Dylan Thomas, Sea The Stars and Golden Horn all won the Irish Champion Stakes at Leopardstown before following up at Longchamp, while last year’s runner-up Found went one better at Chantilly when beating stable-companion Highland Reel, a potential Arc contender again this year, who had finished only seventh (on softer ground) at Leopardstown. Carroll House (when the race was run at Phoenix Park) and Suave Dancer are earlier Arc winners to have been successful in the Irish Champion Stakes beforehand.   

There is a good chance this year, of course, that the future Arc winner won’t be in action anywhere at all this weekend. Enable has had a busy summer already and will be going straight to the Arc after her latest impressive Group 1 success in the Yorkshire Oaks last month. She’ll be following a similar path to that taken by her trainer John Gosden with his 2014 Oaks and King George winner Taghrooda, though that filly suffered a shock defeat at York (when in season) prior to finishing third in the Arc. Taghrooda was the latest Oaks winner to meet with defeat in the Arc – Enable will be bidding to become the first.