RACING/ENGLISH ST LEGER:ORDINARILY FAME And Glory's attempt to secure a second Curragh Classic three years after the first would constitute a highlight. But 2012's Leger Day is anything but ordinary. Instead Fame And Glory and everything and everyone else pales into insignificance beside Camelot's historic Triple Crown attempt at Doncaster.
Even the fact that a win for Camelot in the world’s oldest Classic will give Aidan O’Brien a unique clean sweep of this year’s English Classics has to stand in the wings, not to mention the Curragh’s other Group One contest this evening, the Goffs Vincent O’Brien Stakes.
At a late 6.40pm off-time, that will wrap up a tumultuous few hours of top-flight racing action on both sides of the Irish Sea and the new title for the old National Stakes could seem entirely appropriate by the end of it all.
It was Vincent O’Brien who trained the last English Triple Crown winner Nijinsky in 1970. There were 35 long years before him to the previous horse to land the Guineas, Derby and Leger in the one year, Bahram.
Even by the time Nijinsky completed the hat-trick, the Leger appeared a comparative irrelevance in the high-finance world of flat racing. Afterwards, its appeal sank even lower, so much so the Leger didn’t figure for even a second in Sea The Stars’ unbeaten Group One rout through 2009.
There were many who reckoned a horse with the commercially important speed to win a Guineas in May, and the class to score a Derby victory in June, would never again be asked to add stamina into an already valuable bloodstock cocktail. And yet it is the world’s most commercial outfit, John Magnier’s Coolmore Stud behemoth, which is pitching its most valuable racing asset into unknown territory. On the face of it, sentiment has won out over finance and the result is a pitch at history and the unique pulling power that continues to revolve around the tag “Triple Crown Winner”.
Nijinsky’s evocative career and name were defined by his Triple Crown, and in Camelot there is another unbeaten colt travelling to Doncaster with an opportunity to carve out a special status within the sport’s history. And even though he has been described as being much the best of a bad crop of three-year-olds, and on official ratings is well clear of his eight opponents today, if Camelot does win, he will deserve that status.
Because it isn’t so much the opposition that will be his test today but the distance: that a colt with the speed to win a Guineas at a mile should also possess enough stamina to face Doncaster’s daunting final 4½ furlong straight, after already racing for 10 furlongs, is a special mix. Certainly, the Leger challenge shouldn’t be underestimated. Nijinsky might have won but it wasn’t as easy as he and Lester Piggott made it look. Shergar finished only fourth at Doncaster and never raced again. Alleged got beaten for the only time in his career and went on to win two Arcs. There is no hiding place up the straight: if you don’t stay, you don’t win.
“To be going for the Triple Crown is something I could never dream of happening,” Aidan O’Brien said yesterday. “The Triple Crown is the full test of the three-year-old. The have to have speed, stamina and courage – they are three most important things when you breed horses. The Leger exposes the last two.”
Adding to the champion trainer’s tension will be that Camelot is ridden by his 19-year-old son Joseph, who during the colt’s Classic campaign has looked the coolest Coolmore customer of the lot. “I have seen the videos of Nijinsky and Lester Piggott and if Camelot could emulate that it would be unbelievable,” O’Brien Jnr said. “He is a jockey’s dream to ride. You let him come alive in your hands.”
During a true golden period for racing, Camelot has not achieved anything remotely similar in pure form terms compared to modern-day titans, Sea The Stars and Frankel. But a Triple Crown would see him carve out his own special place. In his pomp, Fame And Glory spent much of his time chasing Sea The Stars but he has still notched up five Group One victories in a career highlighted by the Irish Derby. Although well beaten into fourth last year, and now rated 10lbs below that 2009 peak, Fame And Glory still looks to have the required combination of class and stamina.
It looks a contest for the older horses as only one three-year-old has won the Irish Leger since 1990 so Brown Panther, part-owned by footballer Michael Owen could be the danger. But whatever happens, win or lose, and whoever else might be in the cast list, it is Camelot’s day.
St Leger dash
3.40pm – Doncaster – English St Leger
6.05pm – Curragh – Irish St Leger
Aidan O’Brien will dash back from Doncaster by helicopter to the Curragh to saddle Fame and Glory in the Irish St Leger after riding Camelot in the English St Leger.
