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£1.75m Celestial King ready for debut at Ascot
After three days at Chester, the racing bandwagon rolls on to Ascot and Lingfield on Saturday and Raphael Freire’s Celestial King, bought for a record £1.75m by football agent Kia Joorabchian’s Amo Racing at the Newmarket Breeze-Up sale in April, will make his eagerly-awaited racecourse debut in the novice stakes that opens the Ascot card at 1.30.
Freire has moved into Freemason Lodge, the now-retired Sir Michael Stoute’s former stable, to train exclusively for the ever-expanding Amo operation and is looking forward to getting their latest big-money buy onto the track.
“He looked very impressive at the breeze-ups and he showed lots of speed there,” Freire said on Friday. “It hasn’t slowed him down coming to us and it’s brought him forward.
“Surprisingly, he was a lot greener than we expected, but we see that as a good thing as it leaves us plenty to work on still and he’s there now and he will run on Saturday with a great chance, I think.”
1.30 CHESTER, HANDICAP, 7F 127YD
The field is down to 14 after Never So Brave, in the coffin box out wide, was scratched by Andrew Balding, and the horse at the other end of the starting stalls, Two Tempting in one, is a warm favourite at around 5-2. The six-year-old bounced back to form at Newbury last time after a lacklustre run at Doncaster in March, and while he is not a natural front-runner, Rob Hornby should have him handy enough to strike on the home turn. The eye-catching booking of Ryan Moore for Charlie Hills’s Divine Libra has also prompted some support despite a draw in stall 11, and he is currently 9-2. The theory, presumably, is that as he is a natural hold-up horse anyway, Moore will drop him in and hope to find the gaps as the pacesetters start to tire.
SELECTION: TWO TEMPTING (nb).
It is a sumptuous afternoon here at Chester, and a near-capacity crowd is converging on the Roodee for the most popular day of the week. I cannot recommend it enough as a track – and a city – to visit, and it is even possible to watch all the action for free, from the Roman walls alongside the home stretch.
Preamble
Good afternoon from Chester on the final day of the track’s May meeting, when after two days of stepping stones to Epsom’s Classics and the Royal meeting at Ascot, the big race is all about backing a winner at decent odds in the here and now. The Chester Cup is a race for the punters, pure and simple, and they have been cramming onto the Roodee in the hope of returning home with a lot more money in their pockets ever since Doge Of Venice took the first running all the way back in 1824 (barely a quarter of a century after the abdication of the last actual Doge of Venice in 1797).
It is, when all’s said and done, just a handicap. But like the Grand National over jumps, the fact that the Chester Cup is a handicap also means that it is not a race that can be won simply by throwing enough money at it. It adds to the fascination. You could hatch a plot to get a horse into this race with a handicap mark a stone short of its true ability, and it could still be frustrated by the draw or bad luck in running as the field makes two circuits of Britain’s tightest track.
Aidan O’Brien won the Chester Vase for the 11th time on Wednesday, and picked up a 12th Dee Stakes yesterday. But in its 201-year history, no trainer – or jockey – has ever won the Chester Cup more than four times, and it took the super-shrewd Barry Hills nearly 30 years to get those wins with Arapahos (1980), Rainbow High (1999 & 2001) and Daraahem (2009).
The Chester Cup is due off at 3.05, and the card’s main supporting race, the 10-furlong Huxley Stakes – the only Group Two event at the three-day meeting – is at 2.35. The sun is out at Chester, the going is good and we’re under way at 1.30.
