For its 10th birthday this weekend, Irish flat racing’s showpiece event of the year gets a new name, an old friend’s farewell, and maybe even Aidan O’Brien’s finest ever training feat.
What was Champions Weekend is now the Irish Champions Festival, although regardless of what it says on the tin inside it still contains some of the very best this sport has to offer.
Half a dozen Group One contests spread between Leopardstown on Saturday, and the Curragh a day later, highlight top-quality programmes worth €4.5 million in prize money.
Cramming the best autumn prizes into a single weekend has propelled this fixture to the front rank of global racing so it’s apt the world’s most famous jockey could say ‘ciao’ to Ireland on its biggest stage.
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Frankie Dettori’s farewell tour continues to be so successful it has provoked speculation about the Italian ultimately adopting a ‘Sinatra’ approach to saying goodbye.
That so many are asking ‘why’ he’s going rather than ‘when’ suggests the 52-year-old is still riding at the top of his game and he has indicated a spectacular job offer might yet prompt a change of mind about retiring at the end of the year.
As it stands however, this weekend is Dettori’s Irish send off and quarter of a century after winning his first Royal Bahrain Irish Champion Stakes, he could go out in style.
His services have been snapped up for the French hope Onesto, runner-up to Luxembourg a year ago, and a major contender again for the weekend’s €1.25 million highlight. If he wins Dettori will equal his old rival Mick Kinane’s tally of seven in the race.
Dettori’s single ride at the Curragh a day later – Porta Fortuna for Donnacha O’Brien – also holds good claims in the Moyglare Stud Stakes.
Saturday’s action features in the lucrative Tote Word Pool and the international element is underlined too by French racing’s most decorated rider, Christophe Soumillon, continuing his chequered relationship with the Champion Stakes.
Successful aboard Almanzor in 2016, Soumillon has come in for flak for some of his other spins in the race, including a year ago on Vadeni.
Joseph O’Brien experienced such criticism himself a decade ago after getting beaten on Australia, but this time the former champion jockey will leg Soumillon on Al Riffa.
The colt is one of nine lining up for what’s regularly ranked as one of the top races in the world.
As well as Onesto there are a trio of British hopefuls including the supplemented Alflaila and Hollie Doyle’s mount Nashwa, a proven triple-Group One winner.
Topping the cross-channel raiders though is King Of Steel, who has yet to win at the top level and whose credentials are closely intertwined with the weekend’s biggest riddle.
So much of the Champion Stakes revolves around what version of Auguste Rodin shows up.
Acclaimed as a potential Triple Crown winner at the start of the season, he quickly looked a busted flush when nearer last than first in the 2,000 Guineas.
That Aidan O’Brien managed to get him back from that disappointment to beat King Of Steel in the Epsom Derby five weeks later felt like one of his finest accomplishments.
Having to pull off maybe an even bigger masterstroke now however might just trump everything else in O’Brien’s 30-year training career.
That’s because Auguste Rodin’s King George flop in July made his Guineas effort look creditable. The regally bred son of Deep Impact and Rhododendron was all but pulled up in the straight by Ryan Moore in what was by any measure a shocking effort.
Explanations for it have ranged from the horse having an aversion to flying, or to soft ground, and even conjecture on how his dam was pulled up after bleeding in the 2017 French Oaks.
There’s no flight required from Ballydoyle to Foxrock and heatwave weather should produce perfect flat racing conditions. Strength in this week’s ante-post betting will also encourage Auguste Rodin fans.
It reflects popular faith in O’Brien’s capacity to pull off miracles, although even by the standards that sees him closing him in on 4,000 career winners it would be a stunning coup if Auguste Rodin were to bounce back again.
O’Brien needs just a handful of winners to reach 4,000, a landmark previously only achieved in Ireland by the jumps supremo Willie Mullins and Dermot Weld.
The latter throws a pair of Irish 1,000 Guineas winners at Saturday’s other Group One, the Coolmore Matron Stakes.
Homeless Songs has failed to replicate her stunning Curragh Classic victory from a year ago since then, so it’s no surprise to see jockey Chris Hayes team up with Tahiyra.
The Aga Khan-owned filly followed up her own Classic success in May with a smooth victory in Royal Ascot’s Coronation Stakes and looks the one to beat on her return to action after almost three months off.
Later on the card, Dettori teams up with Bold Discovery in the Group Two Dullingham Park Stakes. The colt’s owner Marc Chan employs Dettori whenever possible and a mile around a bend on fast ground could be ideal for Bold Discovery.
Auguste Rodin landed the Group Two KPMG Juvenile Stakes on this card a year ago, although at that point even his reputation paled next to Diego Velazquez’s now.
The flashy looking colt was obviously green on his Curragh debut but still won by daylight and put himself firmly into the reckoning for next year’s Classics.
