UAE 2,000 Guineas Trial
Sponsored by Churchill Downs
The road to the UAE Classics stepped up a gear on Friday’s card at Meydan and whilst the picture may have been a slightly cloudy one when the 16 runners in this 2,000 Guineas trial headed to post, it is now a lot clearer. Six Speed did enjoy a ground saving run around the turn and the race definitely set up in a perfect fashion for William Buick, but once the pair got into the home straight, Six Speed stamped his authority on this field and he should prove to be very hard to beat in the weeks to come.
A low draw in stall 5 was a definite advantage (the 2nd and 3rd were drawn 14 and 10 respectively), but Six Speed had the early speed to get himself into the ideal position, reaching the first furlong pole in 14.04s after taking just 5.8s to reach 50 km/h when the stalls opened. His average stride frequency over the opening 2 furlongs was 2.58 per second, the highest stride frequency figure in the 16 strong field for that part of the race and that turn-of-foot allowed William Buick to hold the inside line around the turn, keeping his mount out of the kickback and saving ground around the bend. He was slightly fortunate that when he turned for home, the gap appeared along the inside rail, but Six Speed had the necessary speed and honesty to go through that narrow gap and once asked to stretch, he quickened readily. Final furlong splits of 12.15 and 12.86s were both race best figures and his final quarter of a mile, which came with a late speed figure of 57.2 km/h, was over a half a second faster than anything else in the field. Bhupat Seemar’s son of Not This Time ticks a lot of boxes. He has a high cruising speed, he has reached 50 km/h at the start of the race in less than 6s in both successes to date on the Meydan dirt and this performance confirmed that he should easily see out the mile trip later in the season. He’s cleared 43 mph on both occasions too and has plenty of speed when it is needed. Yes. He did get a dream run round, but there is nothing in this data to suggest that he would not have won from a different draw or position. Early speed can be half the battle on the dirt and he has that in abundance. Six Speed set a very decent standard in the 2,000 Guineas trial and it will take a very good performance to beat him in the main event.
William Buick and James Doyle have had plenty of clashes over the years and although Six Speed was a worthy winner, there were some reasons for optimism with the performance of Doyle’s mount, Legalized. A winner at San Isidro in June, Mussabeh Al Mheiri’s son of Dabster was conceding 5.5 kilos to Six Speed as well as having a much wider draw in stall 14 to contend with. As a southern hemisphere bred, it is always a difficult task to concede weight to the younger horses from the North, but he emerged from this race with a great deal of credit, especially given the fact that he was over 4 lengths clear of the rest at the line. He reached the 4 furlong pole just 0.07s slower than the winner and was forced to race 3 wide around the turn. Despite this, he was the only horse to go with Six Speed when the sprint for home began in the straight and the 12.06s that he recorded for the 5th furlong was a race best figure. Six Speed is the more likely to progress, but on his first start in the UAE, this was an equally impressive performance from Legalized and he shouldn’t be entirely discounted in the future. At a peak average of 25.08 ft, he recorded a longer stride than the winner (24.15 ft) who is a more compact type, but there is very little between the pair on the stride frequency data and with a better draw, it’s not impossible to think that he may get closer. He certainly showed more than the beaten favourite in the International markets, Lino Padrino. He blew the start under Tadhg O’Shea, taking 6.4s to reach 50 km/h and going on to run the slowest opening furlong in 14.83s. He recovered, to a point and may have paid for the energy that he spent in trying to recover from such a slow start, an effort that included the fastest 3rd furlong in the race in 11.23s. He is clearly thought better than this and did finish his race well when winning a maiden here in December. Perhaps that is a slightly harsh assessment. He was bumped at the start when Knight of Glory, who had been awkward in the stalls beforehand, jinked to his right when breaking from stall 1. However, on both occasions this season Lino Padrino has been very slow when the gates have opened and against rivals with the talent of Six Speed, that is always going to give him an uphill task. All 3 horses that finished ahead of him spent considerably longer in the gate (80s+, Lino Padrino 43s) and yet they showed much brighter early speed and even allowing for the bump, he has a lot of work to do to stay on terms with these rivals at the start of the race, before he can be considered capable of reversing the form.
There may be some form analysts who will point to the weight allowance that the winner received and the fact that he had the better of the draw and the gaps came at the right time. However, Six Speed didn’t dive through the gap to win by a nose. He pulled readily clear of the field to win by 3 lengths and took half a second or more out of the other runners in the final quarter of a mile. He was dominant and at this stage, he looks to be the most promising Colt that we have seen so far in this Dubai Racing season.