Perhaps the first big punt of this weekend’s Irish Champions Festival occurred on Tuesday when connections of Alflaila paid €75,000 to supplement him into the Royal Bahrain Irish Champion Stakes.
Shadwell Estates, which retains the colours of its creator, the late Sheikh Hamdan, has opted to pitch their four-year-old into Group One level for the first time in Leopardstown’s €1.25 million highlight on Saturday.
Alflaila successfully returned to action after a 10-month lay off at York in July and is one of 13 horses left in the race after the latest acceptance stage.
The English three-year-old King Of Steel maintains his position at the top of the betting for the Champion Stakes while Aidan O’Brien is set to run both the dual-Derby hero Auguste Rodin and last year’s winner Luxembourg.
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A strong cross-channel challenge is also likely to include Nashwa and, potentially, My Prospero, who was runner-up to Alflaila in the Group Two York Stakes.
Frankie Dettori’s mount Onesto, runner-up to Luxembourg a year ago, will try to become just the fourth French-trained winner of the race.
Dettori is chasing a record-equalling seventh victory in the race, although it will be comparatively new ground for Shadwell’s number one rider Jim Crowley.
The former British champion jockey returned to action at Goodwood on Tuesday after serving a 20-day ban for his use of the whip when winning the King George on Hukum in July.
In the interim, Dettori successfully substituted on Mostahdaf in York’s Juddmonte International which continued a vintage 2023 for the Shadwell team at the top level.
In addition to Hukum, and Mostahdaf’s other Group One triumph in Royal Ascot’s Prince Of Wales’s Stakes, the famous blue colours have been in the spotlight through Al Husn in the Nassau and Anmaat in the Prix d’Ispahan.
Alflaila has yet to run at the top level but was quickly installed as a 5-1 third favourite by some firms.
Crowley hasn’t been a frequent presence in Ireland but the 45-year-old Englishman with the Irish name did taste success at Leopardstown 13 years ago when he rode the Paul Deegan-trained Lady Springback to win the 1,000 Guineas Trial in 2010.
It is 30 years since Sheikh Hamdan’s colours were successful in the Champion Stakes with Muhtarram, while Alflaila also has to try to emulate the 1990 winner Elmaamul.
“Alflaila wasn’t in the Irish Champion initially because he obviously had a little injury at the end of last year and we hadn’t seen him back on the track when the entries were made. But it now makes sense to have a go at this,” said Shadwell spokesman Angus Gold.
“It’s a very high-class race, as you would expect, but we’ll have a go and see what happens.”
The Champion Stakes is the most valuable contest of Irish flat racing’s showpiece event of the year which continues at the Curragh on Sunday and is worth €4.5 million in overall prize money.
Sunday’s Comer Group Irish St Leger highlights the Curragh programme, which features four Group One races in all.
Just eight potential starters remain in the Leger mix after the latest forfeit stage, including last year’s first and second, Kyprios and Hamish. Aidan O’Brien has another prime hope in Emily Dickinson.
Inevitably, the champion trainer is set to be a major presence throughout the weekend action with entries for all 16 races bar Sunday’s €300,000 Tattersalls Auction Sales contest.
O’Brien is particularly strongly represented in the top two-year-old contests.
City Of Troy is set to fly the Ballydoyle flag in the Goffs Vincent O’Brien National Stakes while Ylang Ylang is clear favourite for the Moyglare Stud Stakes.
Karl Burke’s impressive Sweet Solera winner Fallen Angel is set to take on Ylang Ylang in the fillies’ highlight as is Willie McCreery’s Debutante scorer Vespertillo, who was added to the contest on Tuesday.
Leopardstown’s top juvenile contest, the Group Two KPMG Champions Stakes, won last year by Auguste Rodin, sees just two of the 14 entries not trained by O’Brien or his sons, Joseph and Donnacha.
The entry includes the highly rated maiden winner Diego Velazquez while €15,000 was spent by connections adding Joseph O’Brien’s Atlantic Coast to the contest.
The one proven top-flight juvenile winner in the Champions Festival mix is Adrian Murray’s Phoenix Stakes winner Bucanero Fuerte, who is set to take on City Of Troy in the National.
With his owners also having King Of Steel in the Champion, it could prove a red-letter weekend for football agent Kia Joorabchian’s Amo Racing operation.
“It’s a culmination of real hard work from everyone involved, we’re excited and I know the boss is really looking forward to it,” said AMO spokesman Tom Pennington.
“We’ve been looking for an option to drop King Of Steel back to 10 furlongs all year, but so far it has just not presented itself and we’re very much looking forward to it.
“There’s no such thing as an easy Group One, but we’ve been waiting for this race to present itself. The horse is in great form, I saw him at the weekend, and he did a routine piece of work and did it very nicely and let’s hope he gets there in one piece now.
“Bucanero Fuerte has always been a strong stayer at six furlongs and looks as if he’s been crying out for seven. His last furlong has been his best in his last couple of races.
“At the beginning of the season he was a big frame of a horse with an engine, now he is really maturing into the horse we hoped he would,” he added.
