English jockey Tom Marquand is bidding for a rare Group One double when the €5.1 million Irish Champions Festival gets up and running at Leopardstown on Saturday.
The 11th renewal of Irish flat racing’s shop window event has 17 races spread between Leopardstown and the Curragh on Sunday, with six top-flight contests in all.
This season’s headline act City Of Troy is an unfortunate absentee but otherwise it is a typically star-studded bonanza showcasing the sport at its finest.
The most valuable and prestigious race is Saturday’s Royal Bahrain Irish Champion Stakes, where Aidan O’Brien bids for a lucky 13th success in the €1.25 million highlight.
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The power of O’Brien’s team means he can leave City Of Troy at home and still rely on the last two winners of the race, Auguste Rodin and Luxembourg. That pair were first and second a year ago after what turned into a Ballydoyle tactical masterclass.
Connections of top-class horses such as Nashwa and King Of Steel were left frustrated as Auguste Rodin availed of a perfect pace set-up to give his trainer a fifth successive win in Ireland’s officially top-rated race.
The potential for a similar scenario is there with Luxembourg lining up and O’Brien saddling half of an eight-strong field that includes his Irish Derby hero Los Angeles too.
It is a formidable squad to face if you have a target on your back, as Marquand will have on board the favourite Economics.
The 26-year-old rider, one of English racing’s power couple alongside his wife Hollie Doyle, is on the only horse to have never even lined up for a Group One before but whose elite potential is enough to make him clear favourite.
Marquand also has the one to beat in Porta Fortuna in the preceding Group One where she takes on Fallen Angel in a mouthwatering Coolmore Matron Stakes. The last jockey to complete the prestigious double was Kevin Manning in 2008.
It is an enviable but pressure-filled situation for a jockey who has had just four previous rides around the trappy Leopardstown circuit. Those four came at the 2022 festival and included a handicap winner, but this will be a very different challenge in terms of focus.
Marquand is at least familiar with the course, unlike Ryusei Sakai whose first experience will be on the Japanese hope Shin Emperor. Just the second runner in the race from Japan, he could try to emulate his brother Sottsass who used the Champion en route to Arc glory in 2020.
Auguste Rodin’s form may fluctuate wildly but he is two for two at his Leopardstown backyard which jockey Ryan Moore has long since mastered.
Doyle experienced how quickly a rider can be put on the back foot around here on Nashwa last year and, for once, being drawn on the wide outside could prove to be in her husband’s favour.
Economics skipped a Derby campaign after an impressive Dante victory in May and returned to action with an imposing success at Deauville last month. It left the runner-up’s trainer Brian Meehan acclaiming him as “truly special”.
That verdict will be tested in a fascinating scenario where both William Haggas’s flashy chestnut, and his rider, will be firmly centre stage.
In comparison, Porta Fortuna is very much the proven article as a triple-Group One winner, including when Marquand guided her to Coronation success at Royal Ascot.
Donnacha O’Brien’s filly subsequently sluiced up in the Falmouth under Moore who teams up with Ylang Ylang this time.
The other big name is Fallen Angel who hasn’t raced since impressing in May’s Irish 1,000 Guineas. Now racing in the Wathnan colours, she will be ridden by James Doyle for the first time.
To make the most of inclusion in lucrative World Pool tote betting, Leopardstown has a nine-race card for the first time, starting at 1.10.
Marquand has seven rides in total, and they include Maljoom in the Group Two Solonaway where Moore and Diego Velazquez may prove tough to beat. Marquand will ride alongside his wife in Sunday’s Flying Five at the Curragh.
The Ballydoyle team has dominated the Group Two Juvenile and looks set to do so again with Delacroix fancied to reverse previous form with Green Impact.
With such a crammed weekend schedule, the chances of O’Brien recording an eighth St Leger success at Doncaster risk getting comparatively overlooked. It is hardly a vintage renewal of the world’s oldest Classic, although a formidable trio of Illinois, Jan Brueghel and Grosvenor Square will be tough to take down.
Jan Brueghel’s unbeaten winning form has been boosted recently but Wayne Lordan is on the apparent number one candidate, Illinois.
Irish Oaks winner You Got To Me is an obvious danger but first-time blinkers on the Derby fourth Deira Mile help the impression that he’s somewhat overpriced to give Owen Burrows a first Classic success.
