It has never been done before. Ever since Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai inaugurated the Dubai World Cup in 1996, five have tried.
Cigar, Silver Charm, Almutawakel, Pleasantly Perfect and Curlin all struck at Nad Al Sheba in the world’s most valuable race in the month of March.
By November, much like the autumn leaves, their spring form had wilted and they all lost in the Breeders’ Cup Classic.
California Chrome bids to right those wrongs on Saturday (4.30am Sunday UAE time) in the $US6 million (Dh22m) Classic at Santa Anita, a race that has attracted seven other Grade 1 winners in the field of 10 including Godolphin’s Frosted and Juddmonte’s young pretender Arrogate.
Unlike previous World Cup winners, however, California Chrome’s form is on the rise. His defeat of Beholder by five lengths in the Pacific Classic in August was perhaps a career best, and his easy win over Friday night’s Dirt Mile favourite Dortmund last month was flawless.
The five-year-old had his first run of the season in January but trainer Art Sherman believes the giant chestnut, and mount of Victor Espinoza, has never been in better form.
“He is quite a different horse right now,” Sherman said, when comparing California Chrome in Dubai to this week at Santa Anita. “He’s more mature, bigger, stronger, and you can see it in the way he’s running, he’s pretty well focused.
“He’s kind of awesome to watch, to be honest with you. The way he’s running now, he kind of spooks me a little bit, you know?
“He’s showing this speed that I can’t believe. His race in the Pacific Classic was probably the most awesome race that I’ve seen him ever run. I’ve never seen him this good.”
Trainers can easily get carried away by how their own horses are working but Jerry Hollendorfer, a long-time friend of Sherman’s and trainer of Distaff runner Songbird, offered up a more objective view.
“I’ve watched every race that he’s ever run,” the Hall Of Fame trainer said. “I’ve watched him work a lot of times, too, and I’ve really never seen the horse better than he is right now.”
It is very difficult to keep a racehorse at full stretch for a whole season. Aidan O’Brien has achieved it remarkably with globe-trotters Highland Reel and Found, who run on Saturday in the Breeders’ Cup Turf, whereas Sheikh Mohammed Obaid’s Postponed, who won the Dubai Sheema Classic in March, had nothing left in the tank when disappointing behind Found in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe last month.
Bob Baffert, Arrogate’s trainer, believes the World Cup-Classic double can be achieved.
Baffert kept Silver Charm going for the whole of 1998 from the grey colt’s first victory in January. Awesome Again beat Silver Charm in his first run back from Dubai and may have simply been the better horse anyway when holding him off by three-quarters of a length in the Classic at Churchill Downs.
“Silver Charm came very close to winning a Classic – it can be done with the right horse,” Baffert said from Santa Anita. “California Chrome will be very tough to beat. That last race, that’s the best I’ve ever seen him. He is really in peak form.”
Baffert knows what it takes to win America’s richest race, having won the last two runnings of it with three-year-olds American Pharoah and Bayern.
Arrogate, aso of the Classic generation, is a raw specimen; a tall, lanky horse who might well have the capacity to match the record-breaking deeds of California Chrome.
There was an air of fortune about his win in the Travers Stakes in August though when he dipped under the magical two minutes for 2,000 metres, something that California Chrome has never achieved.
Baffert, however, believes that Arrogate’s time may well come at some point in the future and there is the suspicion he is holding out for next year.
“Arrogate is getting stronger and should give them all a big scare,” he added. “He could be a super horse in the making.” California Chrome’s time is now.
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