Smart thinking wins Arc for Bluestocking

You’ve missed the entry deadline by a cool five months, but you’d quite like your horse to be part of the weekend’s racing action. What’s to be done?

For elite racing operation Juddmonte, the answer was … buy in. All it took was a cheque for €120,000 (R2.3-million) and the famous pink, green and white silks were in the line-up for the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.

Yet it was no idle whim. The horse in question completely justified the expensive last-minute strategy by romping to victory at Longchamp in Paris on Sunday in Europe’s most important race.

Asked why he’d asked the owners to cough up a fortune to supplement four-year-old Bluestocking into the Arc just days before the race, the filly’s UK-based trainer Ralph Beckett answered: “I couldn’t think of a reason not to.”

‘Took our eye off the ball’

It was only after Bluestocking had won the Prix Vermeille at Longchamp three weeks earlier that her team’s thoughts had strayed to the Arc.

Arc entries closed before Bluestocking started her British season in May – and even after she won the Middleton Stakes at York, Paris wasn’t really in the plan.

“She’d been placed in multiple Group Ones at three but she hadn’t won a stakes race,” Barry Mahon, Juddmonte’s racing manager, said. “I suppose at the time we took our eye off the ball.”

Bluestocking was well regarded nonetheless and was pitched in at the very highest level – against males – at Royal Ascot and in the owner’s Juddmonte International, placing both times.

Beckett decided his talented charge should stick to female company thereafter and her outing in the Vermielle was part of that. A whipping of the opposition there, on the Arc turf, forced a rethink.

“We were slightly taking it on trust that we could get her back here,” said trainer Beckett. “It went pretty smoothly at home, largely because I didn’t ask her any questions, it was all about wellbeing really.

“She came here in good form, I was pleased with the way she looked in the preliminaries before the race. She’s a real professional, she knows what’s required and she’s worked it out for herself. That makes our job a whole lot easier.”

‘Lucky one’

When supplemented, Bluestocking was priced up at 11-1 by bookmakers. Then she drew a favourable inside gate and support grew; at the off, the filly was 11-2, with the favourite, French-trained Sosie, at 4-1.

Bluestocking’s regular jockey, young Irishman Rossa Ryan, had faith: “When I dissected the form, I was fairly confident.”

Ryan added: “She fulfilled what I thought she could possibly do. I’m just the lucky one to be on her, but there’s a lot of people here who’ve done more than I have.

“The draw was key, and she’s been jumping and settling well. Once I got in behind Ryan [Moore on pacesetting 7-1 shot Los Angeles] I got into a great rhythm and from there on had every chance to win. But we had to see what was really there and she didn’t let us down.”

The rider went on: “A horse can really change your life and she has mine. It’s all down to her trainer and the team at home. They’ve made my dreams come true!”

In a replay of the Vermeille Exacta, French hope Aventure (9-1) was second, 1.25 lengths back. Los Angeles was third.

It was a seventh Arc victory for Juddmonte, the international racing organisation built by the late Prince Khalid bin Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.

Even for non X (Twitter) users, it’s worth checking out a posted video of Bluestocking’s groom and workrider Eric Ngwane, a former SA jockey, as he views the Arc on television in a pub in England (@WHR). The apt caption: “Gets you right in the feels.”

Watch it here: