Amelia Earhart leading Oaks challenge for O’Brien

Amelia Earhart appears to be Aidan O’Brien’s leading Betfred Oaks candidate, with Diamond Necklace staying in French Classic action.

O’Brien has already won the 1000 Guineas at Newmarket with True Love and the French equivalent on Sunday with Diamond Necklace, who remains unbeaten. But it is the Cheshire Oaks winner – who sported an unusual combination of hood and blinkers on the Roodee – who will attempt to follow in the footsteps of last year’s winner, Minnie Hauk.

“At the moment, we’re thinking Diamond Necklace could go back for the Prix de Diane. And we’re thinking Amelia Earhart going to Epsom,” said O’Brien.

“Amelia Earhart has a kink in her, and we saw her a few times do it last year, like she’d go there and she’d go left or right. So that’s why she had the headgear on her at Chester.

“We tried everything through the winter with her and this is what we landed on. This was the way and this is what she behaves the best in.

“That’s why she ran in that. And it didn’t make any sense, because one is to slow her down (hood) and the other is to drive her forward (blinkers). But sometimes things don’t make sense.

“If they work, you just do them. So whatever way she thinks, that calms her down the best. And that’s when she gets into the right place.”

Regarding some of O’Brien’s other fillies with an Oaks entry, it is not out of the question Precise could run in the Irish Guineas and still turn up at Epsom.

“The filly that won in Lingfield, Cameo, could go to Epsom,” he said.

“We always had in our head that Precise could get the Oaks trip and we always had it in our head she could go to the Irish Guineas and come back two weeks after to the Oaks. When there’s one week you can’t do it, but you can do it with two weeks, because Minding and all those did it. So it’s possible.

“If she does go back into the Oaks, it would be another difficult one for Ryan (Moore). Because he’d have to ride her very patiently, where he knows the other filly, Amelia Earhart, will get it (mile and a half). I think that’s all the kind of intrigue about the whole thing.

“Amelia Earhart did behave very well in Chester and Chester is probably as close to Epsom that you will get. It’s on a lesser scale, lesser pressure, but all the things are there. The people, the track, the crowd. They have to deal with a lot of stuff.”