Spare rides don't get much better than live chances in the Epsom Derby, and four-times Irish champion jockey Colin Keane is understandably excited about having his first ride in the race on Dante Stakes neck runner-up White Birch this Saturday.
Last summer Keane was confirmed only days in the lead up to the Irish Derby, before going on to win that race with Westover. He picked up that ride because of his greater experience of The Curragh, but he has only ridden once before at Epsom and is required this time because the colt's recent partner Shane Foley is needed for Jessica Harrington's similarly-fancied Leopardstown Derby Trial winner Sprewell.
Keane cannot count on being quite so lucky again in this fourth Classic of the QIPCO British Champions Series, but he believes trainer John Murphy's striking grey has plenty going for him in what looks an open race, so he is optimistic.
The 28-year-old, who won an Irish 2000 Guineas on Siskin and an Irish Oaks on Even So, said: “It would be brilliant if it happened again like last year, and hopefully we'll get a good clear run and he'll give a good account of himself.
“It's a race we all want to be riding in and it's a lovely opportunity for me to get. As Shane said, you struggle to find one ride in the Derby and then two came along in the same year for him. It's unfortunate for him, but it's great for me.”
He added: “I've been lucky enough to ride plenty of winners for John and his son George, but I never felt I was certain to get the ride. I was hopeful more than anything. I had a sit on him on Monday morning and gave him a canter, and he seems like an uncomplicated horse, so I'm very much looking forward to it.
“I've only ridden there once before, on a filly of Aidan O'Brien's in last year's Oaks, and the course is so unique that I think you need a horse that jumps and travels, then stays well. It's a very good test of a horse, but he looks a well-balanced, good-moving colt and he's been doing all his best work at the finish both times this year, so you would think he'll stay. He seems to tick a lot of the boxes.”
The Dante often proves the best Derby Trial and the race is also represented by the game Andrew Balding-trained winner The Foxes and by the desperately unlucky-looking third Passenger, for whom the supplementary entry from six-time winner Sir Michael Stoute looks highly significant. My Dear Friend was down the field there after being hampered at the start, and Roger Varian's new recruit King Of Steel didn't run after getting upset in the stalls.
Aidan O'Brien has won the Derby eight times, although only once with Ryan Moore in the saddle, and he has the likely favorite once again in Auguste Rodin, who ended his juvenile campaign with a thoroughly convincing win in Doncaster's Vertem Futurity but beat only two rivals when favorite for the QIPCO 2000 Guineas on his reappearance.
O'Brien will be represented by another two legitimate contenders in Chester Vase runner-up Adelaide River and Dee Stakes winner San Antonio. However, it has long been plain that it has always been about the one horse, and he has dismissed the Guineas – over a trip plenty sharp enough and on unsuitably soft ground – as “a mess of a race” from Auguste Rodin's point of view.
He is happy to put a line through it and clearly still thinks the world of the colt, who he describes as “a collector's item”, since he is by Japanese star Deep Impact out of Oaks runner-up Rhododendron, “probably one of the best Galileo mares ever”.
Excusing what happened at Newmarket he said to the Jockey Club: “Auguste Rodin has very much a middle-distance pedigree and he's a beautiful mover, so good ground and better would be preferred. There were a lot of factors which happened at Newmarket which we couldn't control, and we didn't see anything there to suggest we should veer from our original plan.
“When Little Big Bear galloped into him he wiped out Ryan, and then Ryan was stuck in a pocket in a race with no pace, so many things went wrong. Over a mile everything would have had to have gone his way, and obviously it was the complete opposite. He's always been very special from day one, and nothing has changed our mind.”
Charlie Appleby, successful with Masar (2018) as well as Adayar, relies upon the latter's brother Military Order, who beat Ed Walker's big improver Waipiro in a Lingfield Derby Trial switched to Polytrack after parts of the turf course became waterlogged.
Appleby believes Military Order has the attributes for Epsom and compared him favourably with Adayar. He told Godolphin: “They are both high class, that is clear to see, but Military Order is slightly more athletic than Adayar at this stage of their respective careers. Mentally, as well, he's sharper.”
He added: “For me, the best part of the Lingfield Trial was the final furlong of the race where his stamina came to the fore. When the second came to challenge him you thought it was going to be 'race on' but, in a matter of strides, he put the race to bed because his stamina kicked in.
“He came out of the race very well and we've been very pleased with him since. He's improving week on week physically. He's a mile and a half horse, so you don't expect flashy work. That hasn't changed from his two-year-old days and I wouldn't expect it to change. Like his brother Adayar, he goes out and gets the job done.”
Frankie Dettori's final Derby ride will be the Chester Vase winner Arrest, trained by John and Thady Gosden, and he is excited at having a live chance in the race, as well as in Friday's Betfred Oaks, in which he partners stable-mate Soul Sister.
Dettori, who partnered the colt in a gallop at Epsom last week, said: “The Derby is still our most famous race. When I started my career as a jockey you first want to ride in it and then you want to win it. I've been lucky to win it twice. This is my last shot and at least I'm going in with a great chance.
“We always thought a bit of him last year but he was all frame and no muscle. He's done great over the winter, his home work has been good, and Chester was great. He's growing up, getting stronger, and Chester did him the world of good.
“I've got a live chance. It looks a wide-open Derby. I haven't seen any horse dominate a trial and win by five lengths.”
Only one of the 14 runners is unbeaten, yet he is by no means among the race's leading fancies. The Ralph Beckett-trained Artistic Star has won both of his races, just as last year's Derby winner Desert Crown had, and while significantly more improvement is required, he has a lot more going for him than his odds might suggest.
Beckett acknowledges that encouragement for the bold decision to step last month's Sandown novice winner straight up into Classic company came from the colt's veteran owner Jeff Smith, who had the 2003 Derby fourth Norse Dancer, but he doesn't believe in social runners and has no reservations about his suitability for the test.
Dual Oaks winner Beckett, whose unlucky-in-running 2022 third Westover was just a second runner in the Derby, said: “Artistic Star is a grand, straightforward horse. He was quite a late foal and he's going to carry on developing through the year, but I sincerely hope and suspect that he'll cope with the whole jamboree, as he's a very hardy horse.
“Whether he's good enough I don't know, but Jeff likes his trainers to be on the front foot and he ran to a good figure at Sandown last time. He's not a big horse and he's well balanced, so he should go round Epsom all right. It looks quite open so I'm looking forward to it.”
Charlie Johnston has two chances of winning at the first attempt a race which eluded his father Mark, as besides My Dear Friend he also saddles the much shorter-priced QIPCO 2000 Guineas fifth Dubai Mile.
The colt, who beat Arrest by a head in a ten-furlong Group 1 at Saint-Cloud last year, will be a first ride in the race for last winter's all-weather champion Danny Muscutt, whose star is very much in the ascendant.
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