3 minute read
Adayar made the perfect return to action after nearly a year off the track in the Hilton Garden Inn Doncaster Conditions Stakes on Town Moor.
The first horse for 20 years to win the Derby and King George VI And Queen Elizabeth Stakes in the same season last year, the Frankel colt then went on to finish fourth in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.
He was last seen when disappointing in the Champion Stakes just 13 days after his French run and for various reasons had been off the track since.
Having picked up a cough in the spring which caused him to lose condition, he missed the Coronation Cup, Royal Ascot, the Eclipse and the Juddmonte International and trainer Charlie Appleby was relieved to get him back on the track.
Only two rivals were brave enough to take him on, and one of those was his stablemate Dhahabi but the other, Andrew Balding's Masekela, did finish fourth in the Derby.
Is was Masekela who made the running but William Buick tracked him into the straight and it was simply a matter of when he went to the front.
In truth Adayar will have had harder pieces of work on Appleby's Moulton Paddocks gallops as he breezed to three and three-quarter length win, to reward those who backed the 2-7 favourite.
Paddy Power cut Adayar to 8-1 from 14s for the Champion Stakes and to 16s from 20 for the Arc.
While hesitant to commit to either race at this stage, Appleby did admit he would lean towards sticking to a mile and a quarter in the Champion Stakes.
He added: "We didn't want him to have a hard race today because whether we go for a Champion Stakes or an Arc, we didn't want to be worrying about the bounce factor.
"He'll be going to either the Champion Stakes or the Arc as realistically his first run of the year, as to be brutally honest I've worked him harder at home than he's worked today.
"Realistically in Europe we've got one more run. I'm confident that run today won't have taken anything out of him and that's what you want.
"I feel 10 furlongs is within his compass at Group One level and it wouldn't do any harm on his CV ahead of his stallion career ahead.
"Hand on heart I'd like to see this horse in the Champion Stakes, but I'm not taking the Arc our of the equation by any stretch of the imagination.
"I think a mile and a quarter suits him. We saw him last year in the Arc – he travelled supremely well and turning in, if you were a betting man you'd have had your house on him. Unfortunately, ground and that time of year caught him out."
When asked whether which race William Haggas decides to run Baaeed in this autumn will have a bearing on where Adayar will turn up, Appleby said: "We'll certainly be keeping an eye on everything, but we've got to do what's right by our horse and if Baaeed turns up he turns up.
"Of course we'll all be frightened of, and respect, Baaeed. Hopefully William might go to the Arc!
"But if the two of them turn up (at Ascot) it would be great for racing to have two great horses take each other on."
Appleby is trying to use the disappointment of missing much of the season with Adayar as a positive ahead of his next objective, wherever that might be.
He said: "It could be testing ground in France and at Ascot and going in there with a fresh pair of legs is always a big advantage.
"I would have loved to have run him during the summer, but with the hand I've been dealt I'm looking at it as a positive – you're going into the autumn campaign with some fresh legs.
"We saw it with this horse last year in the Arc and in the Champion Stakes. He'd been campaigned in a Derby and a King George and it told at the end of the year."
Buick was similarly delighted with Adayar's comeback performance, saying: "He did it nicely and in the way that you'd want him to do it, so he should be able to build from this.
"We all know how good he is, it's just nice to get a nice comeback run underneath his belt.
"We shown his quality and all his zest, so it was very pleasing. It's quite testing ground out there, for a horse who hasn't run for such a long time you'd imagine he will improve for it."