RACES do not get much more gripping than last week’s Sussex Stakes at the Qatar Goodwood Festival, and an understanding of sectionals added to the appreciation of events. It was billed as a rematch between Galileo Gold and The Gurkha - the one-two from Royal Ascot’s St James’s Palace Stakes, in which the latter was the better horse on sectionals - but there was also the third that day and Irish 2000 Guineas winner, Awtaad, as well as several other smart-or-better rivals.

One question was “would Galileo Gold manage to run easy sectionals up with the pace, as at Ascot?” Another was “would The Gurkha allow him so much rope this time?”

The answers were “yes” - as shown on-screen by the TurfTrax tracking system - and, crucially, “no”, as Ryan Moore wisely positioned The Gurkha on the tail of his front-running main rival, as did Chris Hayes on Awtaad. Rather surprisingly, the others hung some way back.

leisurely

The first four furlongs went by at a pace that was leisurely for horses of this calibre, with individual furlongs passing in well over 12.0 seconds, before Galileo Gold went for home with successive furlongs of 11.39s, 11.10s and 11.20s.

That left most of his rivals in trouble and with ground to make up, but The Gurkha was close enough and had got an opening as Awtaad dropped away, and he forged past in the final furlong to win by a neck.

The only horse to make significant ground from further back was the Royal Ascot Jersey Stakes winner Ribchester, who was gaining so strongly that he would have been in front with a bit further to travel.

The run of the race meant that the overall time was nothing special for the grade - it resulted in a Timeform timefigure of just 100 for The Gurkha - but the sectionals suggest significant upgrades to a number of runners. As at Royal Ascot, they point to The Gurkha being superior to Galileo Gold, but they also raise the possibility that Ribchester could be marginally superior to both in a truer race.

Job done, however, for the connections and the supporters of The Gurkha, with the latter group hopefully including readers of Time Will Tell. But the horse’s victory was not altogether emphatic.

The signs are that The Gurkha is a good miler, but not quite in the league of some recent winners of this race (never mind Frankel) and certainly not unbeatable.

The odds about him for the Sussex straight after Royal Ascot were too good to resist, but I suspect he will be overbet hereafter.