Golden Horn

14th-May-2015

I am backing Golden Horn this morning for tomorrow’s Dante. I think that he could be a horse for money tomorrow morning, and the 11/2 that is available about him now is well worth taking.

All the Dante talk so far has centred around the Derby horses, which is understandable, given how good a trial the Dante is for the Derby. The top three in the betting for the Derby are set to line up in the Dante, and all the focus has been on how the Derby market is going to be affected by the result. Consequently, those three horses – Jack Hobbs, Elm Park and John F Kennedy – occupy the first three places in the betting for the Dante. That means that Golden Horn is available at 11/2, and I think that that is too big.

John Gosden’s horse is not in the Derby. He is set to run in the French Derby instead over 10 and a half furlongs, the same distance as the Dante. Remember that The Great Gatsby sprang a surprise in the Dante last year before going on to win the French Derby.

Golden Horn was a winner on his only run at two, when he did well to overcome a slow start and get up to beat Chester Vase runner-up Storm The Stars by a head, the pair of them clear, in a really good time.

He ran in the Feilden Stakes on his debut this season, and he won it well, staying on strongly to get the better of the useful Peacock, an impressive winner on his seasonal debut at Kempton. The ground was probably a little faster than ideal that day, he should be even happier back on goodish ground at York.

That was just Golden Horn’s second ever run, his seasonal debut, so he should progress significantly for it. Also, it is interesting that John Gosden is running him in the Dante, when he already has Derby favourite Jack Hobbs in it. Perhaps that has added a little to Golden Horn’s odds as well, the fact that Frankie Dettori is riding Jack Hobbs. But William Buick is on Golden Horn. He is not a second-string, but he is priced up as such.

GOLDEN HORN WON (ADV 11/2, SP 4/1)

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