Racing

Spencer reunited with The Grey Gatsby for Coral Eclipse test

Mouthwatering clash with Derby hero Golden Horn in store

Frankie Dettori riding Golden Horn to victory in The Investec Derby at Epsom. Photo: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images
Frankie Dettori riding Golden Horn to victory in The Investec Derby at Epsom. Photo: Alan Crowhurst/Getty Images
Thu Jul 02 2015 - 17:21

Jamie Spencer will again partner The Grey Gatsby for his mouthwatering clash with Derby hero Golden Horn in the Coral-Eclipse at Sandown tomorrow.

Ryan Moore steered Kevin Ryan's stable star to victories in the Dante, the French Derby and the Irish Champion Stakes during a tremendous three-year-old campaign last season and was also on board for his first two starts this year.

However, Moore was unavailable for the Prince of Wales’s Stakes at Royal Ascot last month, instead riding Sir Michael Stoute’s Cannock Chase, and Spencer was back on board The Grey Gatsby as he went down by just a short head to Free Eagle.

Finishing third

Ryan tweeted: “The Grey Gatsby declared for the #CoralEclipse Sandownpark, JPSPENCER1980 rides and should be a great race.”

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Moore is set to partner the Aidan O’Brien-trained Cougar Mountain, who steps up to a mile and a quarter after finishing third in the Queen Anne at the Royal meeting.

Epsom hero Golden Horn is the odds-on favourite to extend his unbeaten record to five for trainer John Gosden and jockey Frankie Dettori as he meets his elders for the first time.

The Clarehaven handler also saddles Prince of Wales’s Stakes third Western Hymn, who won the Gordon Richards Stakes and the Brigadier Gerard Stakes at Sandown earlier in the year and is three from three at the track overall.

A five-runner field is completed by Andrew Balding’s outsider Tullius.

Elsewhere, Dermot Weld’s Postulation faces eight rivals in the Belmont Derby over a mile and a quarter at the New York track tomorrow.

The Harlan’s Holiday gelding has had five races already this season and put up his best performance to date when defying veteran Parish Hall by a neck in the Listed TRI Equestrian Stakes a month ago.

There is a second European runner in French challenger Canndal, trained by Mikel Delzangles. Opposition include Chad Brown’s Takeover Target, who is by the sire of the same name. Brown also saddles Startup Nation.

Aidan O’Brien sends Outstanding to America to bid for victory in the Belmont Oaks on the same card.

Pecking order

While Outstanding may not be near the top of the pecking order at Ballydoyle after failing to make the frame in both her starts as a two-year-old, she can boast a 100 per cent record from two outings this term.

After winning a maiden at Naas in May, she returned to the same track a month later to claim the Listed Oaks Trial over this 10-furlong trip.

She will need to continue her upward curve as the race has attracted a competitive-looking field of 14 runners.

Among the promising fillies in the line-up are Todd Pletcher’s Itsonlyactingdad and Kiaran McLaughlin’s Sentiero Italia.