Last year’s St Leger runner-up Illinos heads a select field of six for the Ladbrokes Big-Value You Can Bet On Ormonde Stakes, the £140,000 feature race on Boodles May Festival Ladies Day at Chester today.
Aidan O’Brien shares the mantle of most successful trainer in the Group Three contest with recently retired Sir Michael Stoute, the pair having each sent out six winners of the race, but Illinois stands out on form here and will start a short-priced favourite to give the Ballydoyle maestro the outright record.
The winner of the Queen’s Vase at Royal Ascot last summer, he was beaten only a neck by his highly progressive stable-mate Jan Breughel in a thrilling finish to the final Classic and was also a Group Oje second to Sosie in the Grand Prix de Paris He ended his campaign on a winning note in a Group Two at Longchamp on Arc weekend.
O’Brien, whose previous Ormonde winners include the subsequent three-time Coronation Cup winner St Nicholas Abbey, said: “We are happy with everything Illinois is doing and we think he’s come forward from last year, when he never ran a bad race and was second to some very good horses before winning on his last start at Longchamp.
“He’s progressing all of the time and we are looking forward to him this year. He’s hopefully one for the Gold Cup, or possibly the Coronation Cup.” The trainer also has a strong hand in the Boodles Raindance Dee Stakes, a Listed race which regularly punches above its weight and went to Derby winner Kris Kin in 2003, and one in which he has had six of the last seven winners.
From five initial entries O’Brien has elected to run Isambard Brunel, an all-the-way winner of a maiden at Navan last year, and Mount Kilimanjaro, who ended last year with a Group One second to his stable-mate Twain in the Criterium International at Saint-Cloud and has already had a run this spring.
Both have Betfred Derby entries with Mount Kilimanjaro the choice of Ryan Moore.
O’Brien said: “Mount Kilimanjaro had a run earlier in the year when placed at Dundalk and he’s come forward a lot from there. We think that the trip will suit him well.”
Ralph Beckett had two viable candidates in Calla Lagoon and Push The Limit, both of whom also hold Betfred Derby entries, and he has opted to run the former, a New Bay colt from a good Juddmonte family.
He said :“Calla Lagoon won a novice at Ascot last year and then finished second in a Listed race at Pontefract, where I thought he ran well. The experience of going round Pontefract will stand him in good stead at Chester, and he shapes as if he’ll stay this trip with no problem. This looks a good place to start him.”
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