IT was a weekend of fairly low expectations for the Irish and British challengers at the Breeders’ Cup “World Thoroughbred Championships” but they still managed to fall short of them. A mixture of bad luck, horses which were not quite good enough, and a solid local defence operating under familiar conditions saw to that.

The one shining exception was the success of Iridessa in the Filly and Mare Turf, in which the Pretty Polly Stakes and Matron Stakes winner delivered her very best and edged out the home-trained Vasilika.

Iridessa’s time of 1m 57.77s for 10 furlongs was very fast, but came with a running start (as is customary in the US) and on lightning-quick going. In relative terms, it is worth a rating of 119 – just one better than her previous best – and came on the back of some notably efficient sectionals courtesy of Wayne Lordan.

Iridessa started the campaign rather slowly but has sure made up for lost time, and is yet another advert for the skills of the multi-talented Joseph O’Brien.

The closest the raiders got otherwise was with Daahyeh (second) and Albigna (fourth) in the Juvenile Fillies Turf on the Friday – dealt with elsewhere – Anthony Van Dyck (third) in the Turf and Circus Maximus (fourth) in the Turf Mile.

Those last two did not entirely get the run of their races, especially Anthony Van Dyck, and finished behind 120-rated Bricks And Mortar and 121-rated Uni respectively. Nonetheless, both Anthony Van Dyck and

Circus Maximus fared better than some more highly rated contenders over the years.

The three most meritorious winners, from a ratings point of view, came elsewhere on the Saturday card, however.

Top billing goes to Vino Rosso, who ran down McKinzie in the Classic with a 129 performance once sectionals have been factored in, though the 127-rated runner-up might have made it a lot more interesting had he not overdone the forcing tactics earlier.

A similar sort of scenario had unfolded earlier when Mitole stayed on strongly to deny Shancelot in a slow-motion finish to the Sprint, both horses running to 127 after their splits have been allowed for.

On the other hand, Spun To Run, a somewhat unexpected winner of the Big Ass Fans (it’s not what I imagined) Dirt Mile, deserves full credit for going hard from the front and keeping going. He gets a 126 sectional figure, while Omaha Beach could make only a few inroads in second and probably was not at his very best.

Other big wins were recorded by Covfefe in the Filly and Mare Sprint, in which she ran to 122, the ex-British Belvoir Bay in the Turf Sprint, also 122, and Blue Prize in the Distaff.

The early fractions were particularly hot in the last-named, and Blue Prize and the second Midnight Bisou came from off the pace to run figures of 120 and 113 respectively. Third-placed Serengeti Empress can be upgraded substantially to 122 on account of overdoing things early (88% finishing speed from two furlongs out).

The overall European “haul” of one winner was joint-lowest (with 2014, when French-trained Karakontie won the Mile) in the last decade, incidentally.