“It’s a lot of lasts,” Frankie Dettori said at Epsom on Monday morning, shortly after giving Arrest, his final Derby ride, a spin around Tattenham Corner before the Classic on Saturday week. “I went to Rome yesterday for my last Derby there. I saw the vice-prime minister and he gave me a plaque to congratulate me on my career, now it’s my last Derby and with a live chance, so good.”
Dettori will be hoping for rather more than a plaque when he climbs aboard Arrest at around 1.15pm on 3 June, as the Chester Vase winner is one of nearly a dozen horses currently on offer at 20-1 or shorter for what promises to be one of the most open Derbys of recent years. And since the jockey had expressed some doubt after Arrest’s win at Chester regarding his ability to act on the track, particularly in the event of quick ground, it was reassuring to see him slide around Tattenham Corner without a second thought.
The real test, of course, will come when he needs to do it again at racing pace, but Arrest was sufficiently well-balanced to draw six-and-a-half lengths clear of the runner-up on the Roodee and also goes to Epsom as one of the few Classic contenders with a win in the book at the full mile-and-a-half Classic trip.
“The most crucial part is Tattenham Corner, where horses can really win or lose the race, and he went around there fine,” Dettori said. “In the straight, it took him a furlong to get organised, but he’s a big horse. Then he went very straight, and I was very happy with him. He’s growing up and getting stronger and Chester has done him the world of good. It [fast ground] is an issue, but Andrew [Cooper, the clerk of the course] always does a great job. I’ve not ridden in a very fast [ground] Derby for a long time, it’s always been good or good-to-soft, so fingers crossed, may the rain continue.”
Dettori’s mount in the Derby Italiano set off as 2.1-1 favourite (and finished only fourth), and he is likely to be aboard even more market leaders than usual over the next few months, as he takes his final rides in a long series of major races.
Arrest could easily be another if the punters get behind Dettori on Saturday week, although John Gosden’s colt is currently only the third-choice in the ante-post betting at 13-2, behind Military Order (7-2) and Auguste Rodin (9-2). Passenger, third home in the Dante Stakes at York last week after a troubled run, is a 7-1 chance, while The Foxes, the Dante winner, is 10-1 and it is 12-1 bar.
“It looks a wide-open Derby,” Dettori said. “I haven’t seen any horses really dominate in any trials, they all won but no-one won by five lengths, so it looks really open and competitive. Every week, they improve, and at this stage we’ve still got two weeks to go and I suspect after this gallop he’ll go on a bit. We always thought a bit of him last year, but he was all frame and no muscle. Sometimes horses from two to three don’t develop, but he has.”
Dettori will be aboard Gosden’s Soul Sister, the impressive winner of last week’s Musidora Stakes, in the Oaks on 2 June – “she took me by surprise, she quickened twice, she travelled and she clocked a good time,” Dettori said of her trial success – while Running Lion, the Pretty Polly Stakes winner, will also represent the yard in the fillies’ Classic.
Running Lion was a second high-profile galloper at Epsom on Monday, under her big-race rider, Oisin Murphy. The filly is a daughter of Roaring Lion, who just failed to get home when beaten two lengths in the Derby in 2018, again with Murphy in the saddle.
“We were delighted with her at Newmarket and she came out of the race well,” Murphy said. “The idea was sensible work and to let her flow down the hill from the six and around Tattenham Corner, then once I got her organised, I let her go forward in the straight.”
Murphy will be aboard The Foxes in the Derby, when like Running Lion, his mount will be stepping up to a mile-and-a-half for the first time. “I don’t know if she’ll stay, no one does,” Murphy said. “She might just find the final two furlongs too far, but it would be a nice way to find out in the Oaks, if I was still on the bridle approaching the three, like I was on her sire.
“They [Running Lion and The Foxes] can both race a bit behind the bridle, and even going to the start, I’m pretty sure neither of them are going to waste any energy. That’s so important, because it’s such a long way down, it’s a mile-and-a-half to the post if they take you on and don’t settle, even for a furlong. It’s really important that they go to post relaxed and then race relaxed.”
