Persian King proves tough in G2 Prix du Muguet at Saint-Cloud
- 28 Jun 2020
Persian King produced a tenacious display when making virtually all to take the G2 Prix du Muguet over a mile at Saint-Cloud in France on Sunday.
The Andre Fabre-trained four-year-old, victorious over the same trip in last year’s G1 Poule d’Essai des Poulains, was immediately sent to the front of the five runners by Pierre-Charles Boudot and soon established a clear advantage.
He was joined on his outside by Pretreville with just under two furlongs left but the Kingman colt rallied strongly, finding plenty under pressure to reassert inside the final furlong and score by a length and a quarter.
Boudot said: “Persian King did it very well today and it’s very good to see him back winning. I felt the horses coming on the outside of me in the straight but Persian King has good stamina and stayed very well in the last furlong.
“He improved today from his first start of the year and there is still more to come. I think his next target is the G1 Prix d’Ispahan (Chantilly, Sunday, July 19) and I am sure that another furlong will be OK for him.”
Newspaperofrecord wins: The 2018 Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Fillies’ Turf champion Newspaperofrecord was back to her scintillating best on Saturday afternoon at Belmont Park in the Grade 1 Just A Game Stakes, putting her rivals to the sword with a facile three-length victory that was reminiscent of her two-year-old performances.
The Chad Brown-trained filly, who was raised at Richard and Sally Aston’s Goldford Stud near Malpas in Cheshire on behalf of her Lancashire-based owner-breeder Allan Belshaw, blew onlookers away with her juvenile hat-trick in 2018, winning each of her three contests by more than six lengths and hitting headlines with a powerhouse victory at America’s showpiece meeting at Churchill Downs in early November. Burdened with great expectations heading into her three-year-old season, something looked amiss when she delivered a disappointing last-place performance in the Grade 1 Belmont Oaks Invitational Stakes after a brace of second places at Grade 3 level earlier on in the summer. A break of eleven months followed.
Her comeback performance earlier this month on June 6 in the Grade 3 Intercontinental Stakes over 7 furlongs at Belmont Park, which saw her put four lengths between herself and her rivals in typical pillar-to-post running style, suggested that the filly might nearing her brilliant best once again.
Saturday’s win over a mile, which was delivered in similarly unfussy fashion, looks to have confirmed just that, with beaten rivals including Grade 1 Breeders’ Cup Mile champion UNI (GB).
Newspaperofrecord’s breeder, Allan Belshaw, operates under the banner of his engineering company Times Of Wigan Ltd and boards his mares at Goldford Stud with the Astons. The dual Grade 1 winner is the most successful filly so far from a dynasty established by Belshaw’s foundation broodmare Simply Times.
“It’s nice to have her back. It was great to see her win the race at the beginning of the month after the disaster that was her three-year-old year, but she’s just confirmed that it was not a flash in the pan,” Richard Aston told GBRI on Sunday morning.
