Gstaad leads Aidan O'Brien's dual Coventry challenge

Leader Live

4 hours ago

The Ballydoyle handler has won the premier Royal Ascot juvenile race on 10 occasions and appears to hold an incredibly strong hand yet again.
Gstaad is the choice of Ryan Moore after he triumphed over five furlongs on his debut, beating a stablemate who had finished second in Listed company previously.
'We always though Gstaad was a very nice horse. He obviously won first time when he beat one of our others (True Love) in Navan and we always thought he was a smart colt,' said O'Brien.
'Warsaw ran at Navan and he was one of three (from the stable) because we were just trying to get those who could be possible Ascot horses out and he was obviously on that list.
'He won very nicely there and he obviously hasn't done much since but he's in good form. We liked him before he ran and thought he was a possible for Ascot but sometimes when you run them, they are very green and Ascot would come too quick but he wasn't. You just don't know until they run, we did always like him.
'Gstaad won nicely and we always thought he was a quality horse and he won't mind an extra furlong.
'I don't think it was a hard decision for Ryan.'
Postmodern has the Wathnan Racing team excited at what might be to come.
A son of Too Darn Hot, he was sent to Yarmouth for his one and only run to date and could hardly have been more impressive in victory.
Wathnan also have Underwriter in the field, but retained rider James Doyle has plumped for the Hamad Al Jehani-trained contender.
'I think James is very happy with his decision to ride Postmodern and we've been very happy with him since Yarmouth,' said Wathnan's racing adviser Richard Brown.
'Hamad Al Jehani and his team have done a great job with this colt and he was obviously very impressive that day.
'He's only run once and it's a huge ask, but that is what this race is all about and there's a lot of colts in the same bracket having run once and won well once. We'll find out how good he is, but he's certainly a colt we're all excited about.'
Despite Doyle electing to partner Postmodern, Brown warned the Archie Watson-trained Underwriter (James McDonald) should not be overlooked. Like Postmodern, he is unbeaten after his sole racecourse appearance to date.
'He was very impressive at Ayr and has done everything right since,' continued Brown.
'He's not to be forgotten, let me tell you, and we're very lucky we start the week with two big bullets to fire.'
Charlie Appleby's Military Code has done nothing wrong to date, winning both of his outings, most recently gaining course experience at Ascot when beating Fitzella, who is well fancied for the Albany later in the week.
Appleby told the Godolphin website: 'Military Code's form is rock solid and we are looking forward to stepping him up to six furlongs. He has put up two strong performances to date, including one under a penalty, and should hopefully be very competitive at this level.'