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Thanks Stevie!! Yes a chip off the old block isn’t he?!! The front two very impressive I thought.
"this perfect mix of poetry and destruction, this glory of rhythm, power and majesty: the undisputed champion of the world!!!"
More good news for Fair Eva fans as well – Nations Alexander ran a cracker to finish a close-up 3rd in the Cherry Hinton. She should get an RPR of 100+ now Steve!!!
"this perfect mix of poetry and destruction, this glory of rhythm, power and majesty: the undisputed champion of the world!!!"
As I said earlier in the thread, Roly Poly was my fancy for the Cherry Hinton and I had her at 7/1 each-way today.
Delighted to see Nations Alexander run so well on this ground and her rating of 88 coming in after winning a Listed Race, looks bollocks after being beaten a half length and a head in a group 2 on good ground. It must have been a hell of a poor renewal of the Cherry if the Racing Post figures are correct.
Oddly, James Willoughby chose to have multiple orgasms about how cracking a horse Bletchley could be later in the year and on ground with cut. Hey ho, he could be right but it seemed odd to focus on a horse who was 6th and may have been a bit flattered last time with favourite Cuff fracturing her knee in the Albany won by Brave Anna.
I certainly prefer Fair Eva to Brave Anna for the 1000 Guineas at odds of 16/1 and 20/1 respectively at the moment. Nasimi went out to 50/1 and you can get 40/1 on Bletchley.
Unbelievably Cuff is still quoted at 33/1 in a few places despite being retired. Even more unbelievably the Royal Ascot Gold Cup winner Order Of St George is quoted by three firms at 20/1 for the race. A four year old male horse, two and a half mile winner, in the betting for a 3yo only, fillies only race over a mile. There’s just so much wrong with that. Ffs can’t people do their jobs properly for once?
Order Of St George in the 1000 Guineas? And Jesus Wept.
Thanks for the good crack. Time for me to move on. Be lucky.
Both French Frankel’s keep their engagements today at Clairfontaine. Last Kingdom is the favourite at 2.90 on the PMU for the second race, the Prix Matahawk. Toulifaut is favourite at 2.50 on the PMU for the fourth race, the Prix Vale.
Frankuus skips the Superlative Stakes at Newmarket today, to leave Cunco taking on Churchill’s substitute War Decree from the O’Brien stable. War Decree is a warm favourite at 13/8 at the moment and still shortening, with Cunco at 5/1.
Last Kingdom came in from 3.0 to 2.50 on the betting site I checked and with the Frankel success rate so far you might feel that Andre Fabre is under pressure not to be the “French Diddy” with failure today.
Toulifaut had eased slightly to 2.80 on the same site and she is in the hands of Jean-Claude Rouget, and the stable had a very promising 2yo debutant winner at Chantilly yesterday. It’s been Rouget’s year so far in France and I read early this year that he felt he had a good 3yo and 2yo team this season. Hopefully this is another one of those.
As I said on Joni’s thread, Cunco has a good chance today and I feel South Seas is worth opposing given that his 8l debut was on gutters and this is completely different today. Runner up Winning Ways flopped next time but he may have hated the soft again.
I ended up doing War Decree at 9/2 and Boynton at 10/1 as a saver.
I wish Cunco well but feel that Aidan’s son of War Front will love the ground and improve markedly from his previous win. His trainer should have a line on Cunco through Churchill and his relative position with War Decree.
From a selfish perspective, I am hoping bookmakers are suffering “First Decree Burns” today
Will post the replays for the French races when they become available.
Thanks for the good crack. Time for me to move on. Be lucky.
Toulifant won!
Recording of the Last Kingdom race here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCQFZWLVyPs&feature=youtu.be
I watched both races live.
Last Kingdom just never looked like catching Mate Story. The last show I caught for Last Kingdom was 1.5 or 1/2 in old money. The winner may be a good sort.
The ever reliable Jean-Claude Rouget soon restored normal service and left the “French Diddy” moniker with Andre Fabre as Toulifaut prevailed by half a length. She seemed to head across to the rail as she made her challenge but hit the front and kept on strongly to win.
I will wait for the replays to get a better look at them and will post them here.
Toulifaut was returned just under 6/4.
Jean-Claude is the kiddie!
Thanks for the good crack. Time for me to move on. Be lucky.
This was Toulifaut winning the later race:-
http://www.thoroughbreddailynews.com/race-replays/2/2191/
Watching it again she travels well most of the way and seemed reasonably tractable and settled in behind. When three of them went forward almost line abreast Toulifaut looked a little smaller and less stocky as the meat in the sandwich, with the other two forming relatively thick slices of Hovis as the bread either side.
As I said earlier, she seemed to drift to the rail as she passed the horse on the right hand side of the screen but once she got there it was no more than hands and heels in winning from the promising looking Andre Fabre filly.
Disgracefully, the ATR website showed the field for this race as being three runners and Toulifaut wasn’t one of those three
Fair Eva is still the best of these Frankels by some way thus far, in my opinion.
Thanks for the good crack. Time for me to move on. Be lucky.
Watching Last Kingdom again, he comes out of the stalls like a snail and is well back early. He made good headway late on but I felt his run just petered out slightly, probably due to the sticky start catching up with him.
I felt the winner Mate Story looked a good specimen and it might be unwise to feel he was a lucky winner today due to the Fabre horse’s tardy start. I felt he was keeping on very strongly in front and might be a talented son of Makfi out of a Giant’s Causeway mare.
Thanks for the good crack. Time for me to move on. Be lucky.
Completely missed the Frankel French runners today as I couldn’t get on with Paddy Power today, couldn’t find the race and had to rush as I was going to Newmarket.
Did see Cunco in the flesh today, but only just. He came into the paddock really early, did one circuit and was then ponied to post. He ran a most confusing race where he was up with the pace in the first half of the race, then seemed to lose concentration, looking at the crowd and drifting left before running on again at the end to be 4th. Didn’t think being ponied to post did him any favours you could see he was itching to get past the pony and run free.
Things turn out best for those who make the best of how things turn out...Thanks for posting Steve. Yes two good runs and another winner. Both showed promise. Toulifaut seemed very uncomplicated and showed a nice our of foot. Andre Fabre has more Frankel’s than any other trainer and it is likely he will be bringing them along slowly. As you say, Last Kingdom blew the start (like several of them seem to do!) but had every chance after that and ran on well behind a useful looking winner.
I saw the Cunco race this morning and it has to be said this was the first really disappointing run from a Frankel. I know they wanted to let him use his stride yesterday and he did seem to travel well enough but he was then completely outpaced and seemed to lose his balance before running on again up the hill. He wouldn’t be the first horse not to like Newmarket and I doubt we will see him run over 7f again but I also have to accept he is unlikely to be a champion. I would expect JG to give him a rest now and perhaps try and give him a confidence booster over a mile later on in the season. All is not lost but he certainly lacked the turn of foot of the front two who really impressed.
It looks like being a quiet week with only Queen Kindly entered for a novice event at Catterick on Wednesday. I think Fair Eva could run the week after and I agree with Steve that she, along with perhaps Seven Heavens, seem to be the best prospect so far. A long way to go though!
"this perfect mix of poetry and destruction, this glory of rhythm, power and majesty: the undisputed champion of the world!!!"
A really interesting early analysis of how Frankel is doing, from Simon Rowlands: https://www.thoroughbredracing.com/articles/frankel-first-season-sire-hows-he-doing-so-far/
This gets beyond the headline hype of the runners: winners stat (which is highly impressive) to highlight (on the positive side) the off-the-scale median rating of these runners and (on the negative) the number of runners from his first crop, which is low.
There is an interesting snippet from Big JG (who must be getting to know these Frankels by now!) on C4’s twitter feed: Frankel, predictably, is passing on the trait that HRC and his staff managed to tame, i.e. the wilfulness. So, these are challenging horses to train, and to bring to the racecourse, which might explain the low number of runners. JG’s use of the old American tactic in pony-eying Cunco to the start @ Newmarket, plus the hood on Seven Heavens in the pre-parade @ Newmarket, and use of the same grackle noseband with the sheepskin pad that Frankel wore, show how he is endeavouring to manage them.
Although it is still ‘early days’, it will be interesting to see how that median rating progresses through the season. At the back of my mind is the thought that perhaps the less good ones (there must be some!) or totally intractable, may never make it to the track, such is the weight of expectation, and that what we are seeing here is a median figure that is not strictly comparable to that of other sires?
Really good post and excellent article. Thanks Titus. I wonder if trainers are feeling the pressure of the 100% success rate and are waiting until their’s are ready to win? I know that Hugo Palmer withdrew Majoris a couple of times recently on account of softish ground (even though Frankel excelled under such conditions). HP’s excuse was that he didn’t want to waste a run on poor ground to a horse of that quality.so it may be that the low numbers are somewhat down to the unseasonably poor weather we have had up to now. Inevitably I think trainers will be wanting to show that they can train these (clearly) not-so-straightforward Frankels as there will be many to follow down the years. Much was often said on this forum as to how Sir Henry kept Frankel in cotton wool through much of his career but we are already seeing why that was and what an achievement it was. Of course this wilful trait started with his mother who was bred to be a middle distance mare but who refused to settle so ended up a listed class sprinter. It may well be that many never get to fulfil their potential as Frankel did. Clearly even a trainer as good as JG is still searching for the formula. I would suggest asking Shane Featherstonehaugh….
"this perfect mix of poetry and destruction, this glory of rhythm, power and majesty: the undisputed champion of the world!!!"
I agree Jonibake – for me, one of the interesting sub-storylines on Frankel as a sire is the exam that he is clearly going to set trainers, and continue to set them every year! As you say, (given the current huge books), there are going to be a lot of these about in future years. A lot of Frankel’s future reputation is going to rest in their hands, and – given the combination of talent and difficulty some of them pose – literally in the hands of their top work riders. HRAC was always very clear how much Shane Featherstonehaugh made Frankel . But how many trainers with Frankels have a Shane? I wouldn’t know, but – from reading about this in the book – I would hazard a guess that not many have those talents. This might be an issue going forwards.
That JG said what he said publicly about “these Frankels” speaks volumes I think; trainers must be feeling the pressure here. Initially there was the industry pressure – knowing that they have in their care the offspring of the highest rated flat horse there has ever been, whose first book had been managed to give him the best start possible at stud. But now there is the performance comparison that is the day-to-day bread and butter of training. Part of that pressure is the winners: runners stat, which has been fuelled by the media – who would want to be known for failing to win with a Frankel? This is what I suspect is going on with that off-the-scale rating for Frankel’s runners, compared to stallions minus all the hype, whose stock run as and when they are ready to run, and whose ratings are less artificial as a result.
As interesting is the ‘progression challenge’ that the Frankels that have already run and won are now posing. On being raised in grade the ones who’ve run haven’t won. OK, maybe they’re not the best of the crop (Fair Eva & Seven Heavens look that, of those we’ve seen), but nothing won at Royal Ascot and Cunco was disappointing yesterday. With that in mind, it’s interesting looking back to Frankel’s 2yo season again – August start; nothing < 7f; evening meeting to begin with … In other words, HRAC didn’t just go ‘slowly, slowly’, he purposefully ran him against future staying types, over the longer 2yo distances, presumably to counter the intractability/fizz problem? Perhaps running them over 6f early on as 2yos isn’t in their best interests longer term?
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