Ebor Festival: Young pretender Time Test ready to take on the Classic champions

york chairman Teddy Grimthorpe will be forgiven for having divided loyalties when Classic champions Golden Horn and Gleneagles put their reputations on the line in tomorrow’s £850,000 Juddmonte International – the richest horse race ever to be staged in the county.
Frankie Dettori celebrating victory on Golden Horn in the Derby at Epsom Racecourse in June.Frankie Dettori celebrating victory on Golden Horn in the Derby at Epsom Racecourse in June.
Frankie Dettori celebrating victory on Golden Horn in the Derby at Epsom Racecourse in June.

As racing manager to Juddmonte supremo Prince Khalid Abdullah, he is absolutely delighted that the International – the best Flat race in the world on official ratings – has attracted such an illustrious line-up with eight runners declared for the day one highlight of the Welcome to Yorkshire Ebor Festival.

Yet Lord Grimthorpe will also be hoping that Prince Khalid’s late maturing Time Test, an emphatic winner of the Tercentenary Stakes at Royal Ascot, can spring a surprise against Epsom Derby hero Golden Horn and dual Guineas winner Gleneagles from Ballydoyle with trainer Aidan O’Brien’s pencil-thin son Joseph on a ‘fresh-air’ diet in the hope of making the 8st 12lb weight on the latter.

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“Time Test is in very good form,” Lord Grimthorpe told The Yorkshire Post.

“We have to consider him to be a young pretender rather than a full-blooded contender like the top two as well as horses of the calibre of Yorkshire’s very own The Grey Gatsby in what looks like the race of the year.

“He was a particularly nice yearling and I expected him to do better at two than he did. I think the way he has developed over the winter, not only physically but mentally, has been the key with him. When he reappeared at Newbury first time out this year, we were more than hopeful and he then won at Royal Ascot.

“He’s coming to the race on an upward curve and he will have to show a similar level of progression to be competitive.”

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Lord Grimthorpe says tomorrow’s test will help determine Time Test’s future assignments, but he was particularly praiseworthy of trainer Roger Charlton, who masterminded the career of the recently retired 10-furlong champion Al Kazeem.

“The great thing with Roger is a) he has a great temperament, b) he has shown with Al Kazeem that he can develop horses,” said Lord Grimthorpe. “He has also shown that he can train top-class horses from sprinters to stayers like the Northumberland Plate winner Quest For More.”

Tomorrow will be particularly poignant for Lord Grimthorpe as the Juddmonte also coincides with the unveiling of a statue of the 2012 Juddmonte winner Frankel and the official opening of gates named in memory of the wonder horse’s late trainer, Sir Henry Cecil.

“It will be a poignant reminder of that great day,” added Lord Grimthorpe. “Frankel was a big part of the Juddmonte International being named as the highest rated race in the world and I still get people coming up to me and saying ‘God, do you remember that day?’ To have the Cecil gates is also very special because of the esteem in which Sir Henry was held by the Yorkshire racegoers – and that was reflected by the public’s reaction when Frankel ran.”

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