News Round-Up: The Irish team for the Breeders' Cup extravaganza are expected to arrive at Monmouth Park in New Jersey tomorrow with Aidan O'Brien's Arc hero Dylan Thomas a widely anticipated European "banker" in the mile-and-a-half Turf.
For the first time there will be 10 races in this year's Breeders' Cup series with three $1 million races scheduled to be run on Friday, including the first ever juvenile race on turf.
Achill Island, runner-up in the Royal Lodge Stakes at Ascot, and Domestic Fund, runner-up in the Beresford Stakes at the Curragh, will represent O'Brien and Dermot Weld respectively in the new race which will be run over a mile on the tight Monmouth track.
Timarwa will represent the John Oxx-Michael Kinane team in the filly and mare turf race and Kinane is expected to team up again with George Washington when the enigmatic former champion miler has another crack at dirt in the $5 million Classic.
George Washington faces a mammoth task against the cream of American dirt performers including the classic winners Curlin and Street Sense but his fellow four-year-old, Dylan Thomas, will be widely expected to successfully wind up his career with victory in the turf.
The double Irish Champion Stakes and Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner is an odds-on shot in some ante-post lists for a race where two former winners, Red Rocks and Better Talk Now, are due to line up alongside English Channel who is generally regarded as the best American turf horse at a mile and a half.
O'Brien's representative in the Mile will be the St James's Palace Stakes winner Excellent Art who will attempt to finally break the Ballydoyle stable's duck in the race after hitting the frame in the past with Rock Of Gibraltar, Bach and Antonius Pius.
Closer to home, this weekend's Group One feature in England is the Racing Post Trophy for which Jessica Harrington is gearing up her Beresford Stakes winner Curtain Call.
The Curragh's racing year winds up this afternoon with an industry day that will see free admission at the gates and some ultra-competitive racing that could reward Michael Kinane's dash back from riding in Toronto last night.
Kinane is on Age Of Chivalry in the opening five-furlong event and although a course and distance success here last month means she has to compete on level weights with the colts, it doesn't look the best race in the world.
Kinane is on an interesting one in the seven-furlong maiden in the shape of Arizona John, a son of Rahy and the Moyglare winner Preseli, who made an encouraging enough debut at Gowran behind Houston Dynimo.
Arizona John was quite green that day and looked a type to improve significantly for the race so that experience should count for a lot against the Montjeu newcomer Washington Irving who holds an entry in the Racing Post Trophy.
Carbonia also ran at Gowran on her last start when finding Soinlovewithyou too good. Just behind her in third was the Kevin Prendergast-trained Almass but Carbonia should relish this stiff mile and can make it third time lucky.
Port Of Spain, a son of Danehill and Dietrich, makes a belated debut in the mile maiden and so a safer option could be Scootch whose third to Queen Of France here in August wasn't a bad effort.
Diamonds For Luck was a back-to-back Curragh winner in 2005, the second of which came off a 7lb higher mark than he has today in the six-furlong handicap. There were signs of a return to form at Dundalk last time and should be worth checking now.
