her win on the Roodeye<\/a> has now been followed by three straight Group One victories, including a neck defeat of a stable companion, Whirl, in the Oaks at Epsom in June.<\/p>\nAnd all the while, there has been a continuing sense that we have yet to see the best of Minnie Hauk.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s a classy filly with a high level of ability,\u201d Ryan Moore, her jockey, said afterwards.<\/p>\n
\u201cA decent tempo on a flat track and nice ground probably contributed to her winning the way she did, and she\u2019s always had a habit of just doing enough.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I asked her to go and win her race at the two, she dug in and the last furlong was easy. She does everything right, she gets the mile and a half well but she could probably come back [in trip], and she seems to handle slow ground and quick ground. She\u2019s professional and does everything nicely and she has plenty of options.\u201d<\/p>\n
The most obvious possibilities are one or both of the Prix de l\u2019Arc de Triomphe in early October and the Breeders\u2019 Cup Turf at Del Mar a month later, though Whirl is also a leading candidate for the same events.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve always felt the better the race, the better she\u2019ll be,\u201d O\u2019Brien said. \u201cShe\u2019s won well in the end, our filly, she obviously stays very well and always finishes her race off well. She doesn\u2019t kill herself getting there but she\u2019s always finishing.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe has to be close to the top of our pecking order for the Arc, she\u2019s an improving filly at this time of year. She could go to the Breeders\u2019 Cup Turf but also the Arc [and] Whirl could go with her.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fillies continue to dominate the Arc betting after Thursday\u2019s race, with Andrew Balding\u2019s Kalpana, the King George runner-up, narrowly favoured at around 7-1, with Whirl and Minnie Hauk at 9-1 and 10-1 respectively.<\/p>\n
Quick GuideGreg Wood’s Friday tipsShow<\/p>\n
Newmarket 12.50 Rajaking 1.20 Ten Pounds\u00a02.00 Enchanted Queen 2.35 Monoceros\u00a03.10 Angel Shared 3.45 Huggable 4.20 Venezuelan<\/p>\n
York 1.50 French Duke (nb) 2.25 Trawlerman\u00a03.00 Lifeplan 3.35 She\u2019s Quality (nap) 4.10 Zgharta\u00a04.45 Naval Light 4.45 Sea Force\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ffos Las 2.10 Navid 2.45 Lost Signal 3.20 Cypriot Diaspora 3.55 Step Along 4.30 The Pug 5.00 Sea Of Charm<\/p>\n
Hamilton 5.05 August George 5.35 Seren Star\u00a06.05 Tiernan 6.35 Defiance 7.05 Naana\u2019s Sparkle\u00a07.35 The Good Biscuit 8.05 Global Effort\u00a0<\/p>\n
Goodwood 5.15 Joycean Way 5.48 Coconut Cove\u00a06.18 Noche Clasica 6.48 Eternal Blessing 7.18 On Edge 7.48 Kiss And Run<\/p>\n
Thank you for your feedback.<\/p>\n
Friday tips: A Quality pick in Nunthorpe<\/p>\n
Ten juveniles have tried and failed to take advantage of the weight concession from their older rivals since Kingsgate Native\u2019s success in the Nunthorpe Stakes in 2007, but that has not deterred the connections of Lady Iman and Spicy Marg, who will face 15 rivals in the feature race on day three of York\u2019s Ebor Festival.<\/p>\n
Both are fillies and so get the maximum allowance, with just 8st 2lb to carry, and Lady Iman, unbeaten at the five-furlong trip, is the narrow favourite at around 5-1 in the early betting for what is an exceptionally open renewal of the meeting\u2019s big sprint.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s Quality (right) can atone for a narrow Goodwood defeat by Jm Jungle when they meet again in the Nunthorpe at York. Photograph: Ian Headington\/racingfotos.com\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n
In all, a dozen of the 17 runners are priced up at between 5-1 and 20-1, for a race that has had winners at 100-1, 40-1 twice and 28-1 over the last 15 years. Timeform\u2019s ratings confirm that there is very little to choose between the majority of the field, and that while Lady Iman undoubtedly has more scope for improvement than most of her rivals, she still has something to find with several runners at bigger odds.<\/p>\n
Solid alternatives include Jm Jungle, who has excellent track form and put up a career best to win the Group Two King George Stakes at Goodwood last time, but fillies and mares have a fine record in the Nunthorpe in recent years and York is also likely to play to the strengths of the runner-up there, She\u2019s Quality (3.35).<\/p>\n
Jack Davison\u2019s filly has been second on all four of her starts this season, and showed impressive speed to lead until well inside the final furlong in the Charge at Sandown on Eclipse day. She should see things out better on the Knavesmire and is an interesting bet at around 10-1 to give her a trainer a first Group One success.<\/p>\n
York 1.50 French Duke has struggled to get involved from tricky draws at Ascot and Goodwood on his last two starts, but deserves one more chance to rediscover his promising three-year-old form in a smaller field, and at a track that gives his rider more room for manoeuvre.<\/p>\n
York 2.25 John and Thady Gosden\u2019s Trawlerman established himself as the leading stayer in Britain with a seven-length success in the Ascot Gold Cup last time and a 3lb penalty for that win is unlikely to prevent him following up.<\/p>\n
York 3.00 This is not the strongest renewal of the Gimcrack by any stretch and the likely favourite, Do Or Do Not, is still a maiden after five starts, so the way could be open for the once-raced Lifeplan to follow up his cosy debut success at Thirsk in July.<\/p>\n
York 4.10 Zgharta had no luck at all in running at Goodwood last time and will be strongly fancied to make amends off the same mark.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Queen, no less, wanted to be in the post-race photographs with Minnie Hauk after her win in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":84600,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[3004,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-84599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-racing","tag-racing","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84599"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84599\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}