With £200,000 sloshing around in prize money, this afternoon’s July Cup at Newmarket represents a considerable honeypot. As you might expect, there are many aspirants buzzing around for their share of the richest sprint ever run in Europe. If all 20 declared went to post, the maximum permitted, this would be the race’s biggest field this century.
It is, however, a big if. If the dark clouds which have been scudding across Headquarters this week dump any more rain on the July course, then several of the combatants could be removed. Iron Mask is unlikely to run and Roger Charlton has warned that Harmonic Way, winner of the Cork and Orrery Stakes, will not do so unless the ground dries out. Others under threat are Tillerman, Volata and Vision Of Night.The sprinting sphere has gone through a considerable lull in recent times.

For example, for four consecutive years in the 1980s this race produced Marwell, Sharpo, Habibti and Chief Singer. The only one to compare with them in modern seasons is Stravinsky, the victor two years ago.Nevertheless, today’s July Cup will not fail as a spectacle, containing as it does several runners who will try to cover the six furlongs in just about a single gulp of air. The stalls will be on the stands side, which should allow an advantage to those drawn high. Expect the early notables to include Three Points, Mozart and Cassandra Go. They will not be stopping for passengers.This is Cassandra Go’s last race before she goes into an equine nursing home.

She is carrying to Green Desert, a condition which has not prevented Geoff Wragg’s filly showing the form of her life on her last two outings. Most recently, she won Royal Ascot’s King’s Stand Stakes, but that was over a stiff five furlongs and on firmish going.Mozart takes the opposite route. He is dropping back from seven furlongs, the distance of his victory in Jersey Stakes at the Royal meeting. With some long-priced horses just behind him that day, the suspicion remains that it was not the strongest renewal.Aidan O’Brien’s colt will, all the same, be one of the market leaders, alongside one of the hyped horses of Newmarket, Shibboleth. Their presence creates value elsewhere, most notably about Lincoln Dancer and Pipalong, who were second and third to Agnes World in this contest 12 months ago Both operate on soft ground. As he is the better drawn, slight preference lies with LINCOLN DANCER (nap 3.05).The other great betting race of the day is the Bunbury Cup. An improbable selection here is Bold King (next best 3.40), who has come up against 35 horses on his last two starts, at Ascot and Sandown, and managed to beat just one of them However, those dribbling efforts came on firm ground.

The six-year-old can be judged far more favourably on his second to Nimello at Kempton in May. That was on the sort of terrain he will encounter today.Redback (2.05) has frightened away most of the opposition on the basis of his fourth in the Coventry Stakes. Another to graduate from the Royal meeting is Spanish Spur (2.35), who never got into the race in the Britannia Stakes but is worth another chance.. For a brief, almost blessed, moment here yesterday, David Loder’s return of three winners from every four runners this season suddenly looked just a little bit thin. For a brief, almost blessed, moment here yesterday, David Loder’s return of three winners from every four runners this season suddenly looked just a little bit thin.
A strike-rate of 75 per cent is all very well, but Ralf Suerland is one trainer who could look Loder in the eye and say, “Pah!”. At any rate, he could if he were about a foot taller, for Suerland is every inch the jockey-turned-trainer.A leading jockey in his native Germany for 22 years, he can count the 1975 German Derby among more than 700 successes, but none can have given him as much pleasure as that of his mare Proudwings in the Falmouth Stakes here yesterday.The first German-trained winner of a British Group race since Star Appeal in the 1975 Eclipse, Proudwings was also Suerland’s first runner in England, and 100 per cent is as impressive as strike-rates ever get. “She is the best horse I have had in my 10 years as a trainer,” he said, “and she has now won in four different countries, Germany, France, Italy and England.”We decided on this race after her last run at Chantilly, when she did not get a good ride from Dominique Boeuf.

I think that after this we will go to Deauville for the Prix Jacques le Marois.”While Dominique Boeuf’s ears were turning red, Yutaka Take, who replaced him on Proudwings yesterday, was enjoying his latest moment of triumph at the July course.Take’s rare journeys to this country have mixed victory and mishap in equal measure, and British punters are just as likely to swear at him as by him.Almost a year to the day after his success on Agnes World in the July Cup, however, this was Take the polished professional, sitting just off the pace before kicking Proudwings into an impregnable lead with a quarter of a mile to race. She had two lengths to spare over Heavenly Whisper at the line, and, while this was by no means the strongest Group Two of the year, she fully deserves a chance at the highest level. Loder, meanwhile, could manage only a 50 per cent success rate with his two runners yesterday, as Auriferous, who started at 4-6 for the novice stakes, could finish only sixth of seven behind Esenin, who cost Michael Tabor 200,000gns as a yearling. Loder’s serious work had already been done, though, when Meshaheer took the Group Three July Stakes at odds of 1-3. Meshaheer was desperately unlucky to finish only third in the Coventry Stakes at Royal Ascot, and it will not be until his next race, probably the Gimcrack Stakes at York, that Meshaheer’s true merit will become clear. As a result, he remains a 25-1 chance for next year’s 2000 Guineas with all the major layers “He’s a good horse, very natural,” Loder said.