THURSDAY evening’s Meydan meeting stepped up a level and included a pair of listed races, featuring The Entisar over 10 furlongs and the six-furlong Garhoud Sprint, both run over the same dirt course and distance as the Group 1 Dubai World Cup and the Group 1 Dubai Golden Shaheen. Each was won by a runner trained by Salem bin Ghadayer.

Settled in second by Xavier Ziani and stalking Saltarin Dubai, the lightly-raced seven-year-old Dubawi gelding Firnas edged ahead more than six furlongs from home and kept on galloping, challenged throughout by his rival. The pair locked horns all the way up the home straight, but Firnas kept finding more.