It’s another Thursday at Meydan and the previous meetings have been quite kind to us. Ihtimal is the star performer on show as she aims to follow up her UAE 1000 Guineas victory in the UAE Oaks.
Regular followers of this column will know that Ihtimal has provided us with some profitable days already in her short career and we’re already on for the Guineas this summer. It was no surprise to see her outclass her rivals at Meydan but it’s always good to see that a filly has trained on.
Saeed bin Suroor had no hesitation in naming Ihtimal as his best classic filly and she steps up to nine furlongs tomorrow for the first time. She finishes her races so strongly that you can easily see her staying the Oaks trip.
There seems no reason why any of those that finished behind her last time should get any closer. Mensoora, Feedyah and Magrooma were all well held and I’d be very confident of a similar result tomorrow.
It will be interesting to see how Wednaan runs in the previous race after his promising third behind Long John. The winner was very impressive that day but Wednaan was having only his second race after winning at Yarmouth as a two-year-old and can step up on that performance here.
Most of the attention is focussed on the up-coming Cheltenham festival and the weights were published today for the eleven handicaps. There are more than 1,000 entries so that is going to take a good few hours to unravel!
Medinas gave me a thrilling 40-1 win in the Coral Cup last year but won’t be going for a repeat after being allocated 11st 12lb. He’s only the size of a pony and Alan King quickly decided that he may as well hunt round in the World Hurdle and see if he can pick up some place money.
The early “talking horses” are the JP McManus pair of Regal Encore and Pendra. Regal Encore looks as though he will be going for the Imperial Cup to try and get a penalty to get in at the festival. His defeat at Plumpton looks better in view of the winner’s subsequent victory at Haydock but I cannot believe Bet365 are offering only 7-2 about him for the Martin Pipe Hurdle.
Charlie Longsdon has named Pendra as his best chance of the meeting and announced that he had “protected his handicap mark”. Not surprisingly he is now among the favourites for the novices handicap on the opening day but he’s not one for me.
Ihtimal
Wednaan
