Economics © Photo Healy Racing
Dante winner Economics takes on Royal Ascot hero Jayarebe as the Prix Guillaume d’Ornano throws up a mouthwatering midweek treat at Deauville on Thursday.
The William Haggas-trained Economics was a six-length winner York’s Derby trial in mid-May, but connections resisted the temptation to head to Epsom and he has since enjoyed a mid-season break.
Potential returns to the Knavesmire for last month’s York Stakes and the Juddmonte International next week were considered, but the Night Of Thunder colt instead cross the Channel for a second Group Two assignment, and Haggas could not be happier with his condition.
“He’s fine and is on his way to Deauville as we speak,” the trainer told Sky Sports Racing.
“We looked at the York Stakes at the end of July but he wasn’t ready for that, so it was either this or the Juddmonte and we preferred to have a go against the three-year-olds.
“He’s still relatively inexperienced. As promising as he might look, he’s still only run three races in his life, so we thought the Juddmonte might be quite a hard ask for a horse first time out for a while.
“He’s a pretty nice horse, I haven’t been looking very hard to see how good he is because that’s not the way we like to do it, but he does everything very easily, he’s pretty fit and I’m very much looking forward to getting him back on track – I can’t wait really.”
Economics holds entries in the Irish Champion Stakes at Leopardstown and the Champion Stakes at Ascot, but Haggas is not looking beyond this week’s assignment.
He added: “I tend not to want to predict what might happen later on or where he might go, I want to get this first hurdle out of the way, but he’s in every smart race at a mile and a quarter that you can imagine and he’ll be aiming at one of those if he’s good enough.”
While Economics was brilliant in the Dante, he did return to the winner’s enclosure with blood in his nose, leaving some to question whether he had burst blood vessels.
Haggas, though, is putting the issue down to him banging his head on the starting stalls, saying: “We think that’s what happened, but we take no chances with him obviously.
“We had a few issues in the spring with that sort of thing, but he’s absolutely fine and we scope him every time he works and we haven’t seen a trace of blood, so that doesn’t concern us at the moment.
“What concerns me personally is how tight the ground might be for him (at Deauville). He’s a great big horse and it’s going to be quick ground, but he’s got to run so we’ll need to get on with it.
“He’s a beautiful looking horse and everything he has done so far has pleased us. He had a gallop at the racecourse at Newmarket about 10 days ago and he looked really good, so I’m really happy with him.”
Jayarebe made an excellent start to his three-year-old campaign by winning Newmarket’s Feilden Stakes, but was then beaten into third place as hot favourite for the Dee Stakes at Chester.
He got back on winning trail when repelling the late surge of King’s Gambit in the Hampton Court Stakes at the Royal meeting, though, and trainer Brian Meehan is looking forward to his trip to France ahead of a likely tilt at Breeders’ Cup glory later in the year.
He said: “He’s great, really happy with him. He seems like he’s improved, he’s in tremendous form.
“Every race is a tough race, but I didn’t feel he had a particularly hard race (at Ascot). I considered the Eclipse, which was a couple of weeks later and it was only the (soft) ground that put us off running there.
“He’s taken a nice, gradual increase in class as he’s progressed and this was kind of a very obvious next step for him, staying in his own age group. The York Stakes was a consideration, he’d have been taken on a few older horses there, and this was always the most sensible route to take with him.
“The plan has always been to take him to the Breeders’ Cup Turf at Del Mar. Depending on what happens on Thursday, where to take him in between is a bit of a dilemma, but saying that I’d be happy to not run him again until the Breeders’ Cup.
“He’s got a good travelling speed. The track at Del Mar is maybe not the ideal track for him, but he has got a good racing pace and he’s just really straightforward and a good galloper and I think extra two furlongs on that particular day would be ideal as well.”
Economics and Jayarebe are two of seven runners declared for the Prix Guillaume d’Ornano, with Ed Walker’s Almaqam a third British raider.
The Lope De Vega colt readily accounted for the smart Kikkuli in Sandown’s Heron Stakes on his penultimate start, but having since been beaten into sixth in the St James’s Palace Stakes, he steps up to a mile and a quarter for the first time.
The pick of the home team looks to be Bright Picture, who has won four of his five starts to date for Andre Fabre.
His only defeat came at the hands of Calandagan in the spring and he has since registered a clear-cut victory in the Group Two Prix Eugene Adam at Saint-Cloud.
