1 of 2 | Hit Show leads a massive 1-2 upset by American horses in Saturday’s $12 million Group 1 Dubai World Cup. Photo by Liesl King, courtesy of Dubai Racing Club
April 7 (UPI) — An old horse racing maxim has it, “They run the races for a reason,” and the 2025 Dubai World Cup program was a case in point.
With one upset more stunning than another throughout the evening, the World Cup served as a reminder there’s no such thing as a sure thing and that even the most favorite of favorites can be beaten.
The event also provided plenty of entertainment along the way. Meanwhile, European flat racing is heating up while the Asian season is winding down.
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Dubai
Saturday’s Dubai World Cup races got off to a reasonably normal start. Even though the favorite, Trawlerman, didn’t get the job done in the Thoroughbred opener, the 2-mile Gold Cup, his 9-year-old Godolphin stablemate, Dubai Future, picked him up to get Sheik Mohammed’s forces on the board.
Then, Frankie Dettori rode the Doug O’Neill-trained Raging Torrent, a solid favorite, to victory in the Group 2 Godolphin Mile, the sixth win from his last seven starts, including the Grade I Malibu at Santa Anita.
Then, things got weird. And they stayed weird through the remaining six races, with an admixture of tragedy in the Group 1 Al Quoz Sprint as the favorite, Hong Kong star Howdeepisyourlove, clipped heels and sustained a fatal injury midway down the stretch. Believing, based in England, posted her first win since last July, although she wasn’t a total shock after some good performances in defeat.
The big favorites in the Group 2 UAE Derby were Japan’s Shin Forever, last seen second in the Group 3 Saudi Derby, and Flood Zone, invading from America for trainer Brad Cox.
They were never in the mix, and instead it was a lesser regarded Japanese runner, Admire Daytona, edging locally based Heart of Honor by a nose. Both earned the right to claim a spot in the Kentucky Derby, but would require a $6,000 supplemental nomination to claim the honor.
The wave of upsets reached crescendo in the night’s premier dirt sprint, the Group 1 Dubai Golden Shaheen, billed as a global showdown between reigning Breeders’ Cup champion Straight No Chaser and last year’s winner and locally dominant Tuz.
That didn’t work out, although Tuz would have had a shot if he hadn’t been boxed in on the rail through the final 100 meters and finished third. Straight No Chaser didn’t run much at all and finished eighth.
Dark Saffron, at odds of some 40-1, got the win with a late run that got him past the Wesley Ward-trained Nakatomi to a 1/4-length victory.
It looked like order would be restored in the next race, the Group 1 Dubai Turf, when Hong Kong-based Romantic Warrior, the world’s top money-earning horse and a Group 1 winner in four jurisdiction, took a late lead.
But along came Japan’s 14-1 chance Soul Rush, producing a finish so close that the placing judges took seemingly forever to call the winner. Given the way things were going, of course that winner was Soul Rush. The official photo showed what looked like much less than an inch between the two noses after the 1 1/8 miles.
France’s Calandagan was practically odds-on in the penultimate race on the card, the Group 1 Dubai Sheema Classic. So of course his late run fell 1 1/4 lengths short of catching another Japanese 14-1 chance, Danon Decile.
Incidentally, Godolphin’s venerable globetrotter, Rebel’s Romance, also failed to produce in the Sheema, finishing fourth and leaving the team with an unusually thin result for the day.
All of those surprises paled, though, in the finale — the Group 1 World Cup.
Yet another of the powerful Japanese contingent, Group 1 Saudi Cup winner and last year’s UAE Derby winner Forever Young, was universally regarded as the night’s “banker” — the most solid of favorites.
He, of course, never got untracked and needed all of his unquestioned raw ability to finish a well-beaten third as extreme long shot Americans Hit Show and Mixto, finished 1-2.
All of which goes to prove the old maxim: They run the races for a reason.
Japan
Bellagio Opera clearly likes the Grade 1 Osaka Hai at Hanshin Racecourse. The 5-year-old son of Lord Kanaloa ran smoothly to win Sunday’s renewal of the 2,000-meters race for the second straight year.
Those are the horse’s only two top-level wins, and he had been winless in three starts between the two. Into the bargain, he won Sunday’s edition in course-record time of 1:56.2.
“As always, he broke remarkably,” jockey Kazuo Yokoyama said. “I expected a fast pace but being able to sit in an ideal position and the horse finding his rhythm were definitely the key factors in today’s win.”
Trainer Hiroyuki Uemura said the timing of the race benefits Bellagio Opera: “The summer’s not good for him, so this is the best Grade 1 race for him at this time of year.”
France
With the Grand National out of the way, European racing starts to shift back to the flat and Qatar’s Wathnan Racing is wasting no time getting going.
Not only did Hit Show provide a stunning upset victory in Saturday’s $12 million Group 1 Dubai World Cup for the operation headed by the Amir of Qatar, but odds-on favorite Map Of Stars followed that up with a stretch-running, 2 1/2-length victory a day later in the Group 2 Prix d’Harcourt at Longchamp.
The 4-year-old by Sea the Stars actually got going in March, winning the Group 3 Prix Exbury over fellow Wathnan runner First Look. Produced by the Dubawi mare Bateel, Map of Stars now is 5-for-6 and looks good for just about any of the big summertime races.