CLASSIC trial season is well under way in France and most of its key races thus far have done little to clarify the three-year-old pecking order, with race fitness proving vital and those making their reappearances from a winter break being at a big disadvantage.
This coming Sunday at Longchamp sees the staging of the Prix de Fontainebleau and the Prix de la Grotte, the two biggest course and distance trials for the Poule d’Essai des Poulains/Pouliches (French 2000/1000 Guineas), and perhaps they will provide a convincing preview of what is likely to happen on May 10th. At the moment the classic picture is as clear as mud.
Last Tuesday, Deauville staged the two biggest Guineas prep races to date, the Prix Djebel for colts and the Prix Imprudence for fillies, a pair of Group 3 seven-furlong events run on the straight track.
They provided one winner, Afandy, who has been gelded and is thus ineligible for the Poulains, and another, Showna, who is not even entered in the Pouliches on account of her connections’ fears that a step up to a mile would take her stamina beyond breaking point.
Both victors had the benefit of not just one but two previous 2026 outings and both are likely to wait until July before they make their Group 1 debuts in the same race – the Prix Jean Prat over this very track and trip.
Trained by Jean-Claude Rouget, Afandy, a son of the Tally-Ho Stud-based stallion Mehmas, was the beneficiary of a perfectly-judged front-running ride from Cristian Demuro and had a length and three-quarters in hand over the 11/10 favourite, Samangan, passing the winning post.
First day back
The runner-up, a Francis Graffard-trained Aga Khan homebred Blue Point colt who had ended his juvenile campaign with back-to-back pattern victories, was given the archetypal ‘first day back at school’ ride by Mickael Barzalona and was hit with the whip only once. Samangan does hold a Poulains entry (and even one for the Prix du Jockey Club over a mile two furlongs and 110yards) but the Aga Khan family’s racing manager, Nemone Routh, stated afterwards that his capability to stay even a mile is far from guaranteed.
The Group 3 Prix Imprudence may be just the seventh group race of the French season but it could well have provided the biggest-priced big race winner of the entire year as Showna, who is trained by the Chantilly-based Japanese expat Satoshi Kobayashi, was returned at odds of almost 65/1 following a dismal eighth place in lesser company a month earlier.
A daughter of owner-breeder Guy Pariente’s own stallion, Kendargent, she prevailed in a style more akin to a short-priced favourite, sitting at the rear of the field until the last quarter-mile before swooping down the wide outside to put fully two and a half lengths between herself and her 11 opponents.
Sub-standard renewal
Just a fourth pattern success for Kobayashi, she clocked a time that was over a second faster than the boys had achieved in the Djebel, but the fact that Kevin Ryan’s British raider, Isle Of Fernandez, who has an official handicap rating of only 90, held on for third place having raced away from her main rivals for much of the trip, suggests that this was a sub-standard renewal.
If there is a filly to take out of the race, it is surely Andre Fabre’s My Highness, who was having her first start in over seven months and, having cruised into the lead, understandably became a little leg-weary in the closing stages and had to settle for second.
She could make a giant leap forward on her next outing and, given that she already has a Group 2 triumph (in the Prix du Calvados) on her CV, it would be no surprise if she were allowed to take up one of her engagements in either the Pouliches or its English equivalent.
MARVIN Grandin may be an unfamiliar name to most The Irish Field readers, but he has been the busiest jockey in France over the past three months and, two days prior to landing the Imprudence on Showna, he had plundered another major three-year-old race in the shape of the nine-furlong Group 3 Prix La Force at ParisLongchamp last Sunday, aboard Seagall.
Fresh from getting into three figures for the first time when guiding home 114 winners last season, 27-year-old Grandin is currently second behind Demuro in the jockeys’ standings. Seagall’s win was another big feather in his cap as it was his first major success in conjunction with legendary trainer Andre Fabre.
A son of Sottsass, Seagall showed the benefit of having had a pipe-opener four weeks earlier to get the better of his stablemate Zaraki by half a length.
Given that Zaraki had been absent since August, the finishing order may be reversed should the pair meet again in either the Group 3 Prix de Guiche on May 4th or in the Prix du Jockey Club four weeks later.
Successful comeback
Last week’s quartet of classic trials was completed by Sunday’s Group 3 Prix Vanteaux, another nine-furlong contest which saw the fllly Concorde Agreement buck the trend of needing a recent run under your belt to make a successful comeback and give her handler, the former Alain de Royer-Dupre assistant Pierre Groualle, his first pattern win in his third full season with a licence.
Eased down in the last few yards by Clement Lecoeuvre but still with a length and three-quarters in hand at the line, Concorde Agreement made every yard of the running to take her career record to an unblemished two-from-two.
She could have a big future, although that may depend on her ability to show her true ability not just when she is allowed to dominate from the front as she has been on both starts thus far.
Groualle said afterwards: “It’s not easy finding one as good as her when you’ve only got 25 horses in your care. Her main assets are her stamina and her long stride. If you rode her in the pack, she would be uncomfortable, tense up and tire herself out.
“My inclination would be to step her up in distance now, Clement said that she had plenty left at the finish.”
By Persian King, she hails from the family of Montjeu, no less, and the Group 2 Prix Saint-Alary followed by the Group 1 Prix de Diane would seem an obvious route to take with her.