Al Adiyat Cup Sponsored by Bareeq
Death, Taxes and Phantom Flight winning in Bahrain. This was a 3rd success at the Bahrain Turf Club for George Scott’s 7-year-old son of Siyouni who continued the remarkable run of form for the Victorious Forever ownership who added the Al Adiyat Cup to their recent successes in Dubai. The Bahrain track clearly suits this long striding 7-year-old and having got the perfect ride from Callum Shepherd, he asserted his dominance in the home straight to run out a comfortable winner by 4 lengths from Hi Royal. If we draw a form line through Hi Royal, who was a three and a quarter length winner of the Al Dana Cup in Bahrain 2 weeks ago, then this looks like one of the strongest pieces of form that we have seen so far in Bahrain this season, but does the data support that theory?
The simplest answer to that question is “Yes”. Phantom Flight had a good setup and he had the benefit of a decent early pace to track from the free running Signalman, who continues to set the pace when he runs in Bahrain, but once the field turned for home, this race became about one horse. In the home straight, Phantom Flight was able to lengthen his stride to a race peak of 26.25 ft, quickening clear of his rivals with the fastest penultimate furlong in the field and recording a late speed figure of 37.59 mph. He was extremely well placed by Callum Shepherd and it is worth noting that the 3rd placed Panning for Gold did record an identical late speed figure after being given a much more patient ride, but with a higher top speed figure of 40.27 mph, it is highly likely that Phantom Flight would have confirmed the result with Panning for Gold if given a similar ride. Getting into an early position in order to get the first run on the field in the home straight can be linked back to the start of the race, where Phantom Flight took 6.2s to reach 50 km/h. For comparison, Panning for Gold took 7.6s to reach the same speed. He was ridden patiently and as such, I think we can dismiss the visual impression that Panning for Gold was given far too much to do and instead take the view that he was running past beaten horses and the sectionals show that he was still slowing down, but that the others were slowing down faster.
That then leads to the question “did Hi Royal run his race?”. Once again, the answer is yes. Having raced alongside Phantom Flight behind the pace, he held every chance but simply couldn’t match Phantom Flight, who was travelling strongly at the 2 furlong pole before Shepherd asked him to kick for home. Hi Royal recorded an average stride length of (24.45 ft) and an average stride frequency figure of 2.29 per second, both of which were within 2% of the figures that he recorded when winning the Al Dana Cup. His Top Speed figure was slightly slower, clocking 39.77 mph in this race compared to the 40.57 mph that he recorded in December, but that is perhaps a better reflection of the fast pace set by Signalman and the fact that he met a higher class rival in the home straight.
There’s lots of evidence from the data to suggest that Hi Royal ran his race and even if we make allowance for the fact that Phantom Flight was well placed, the fact that Signalman reached the 6 furlong pole in less than 40s does point to this race being truly run. Phantom Flight was entirely dominant in the home straight and over a second quicker than Hi Royal in the final furlong. In this form, he will be hard to beat and he appears to be at the peak of his powers, which makes him the most interesting horse in Bahrain at this point in time.