Yorkshire Cup preview: the inside track on the leading players

Amiloc gave his team a year to remember in 2025 and the Boodles Yorkshire Cup Stakes could prove a fitting place for the Royal Ascot winner to attempt to regain the winning thread.

The apple of local owner Vimy Akyroyd’s eye, Ralph Beckett’s four-year-old went unbeaten in his first four outings before not being disgraced in his final two outings at three and now returns in a race long circled on the calendar by his handler.

“He was a star last season and Ralph has had this race picked out since his run at the Breeders’ Cup last year, he said straight afterwards we’ll see him next in the Yorkshire Cup,” explained Patrick Cooper, racing manager for owners David and Vimy Aykroyd who enjoyed Dante success with Amiloc’s stablemate Pride Of Arras at this meeting 12 months ago.

“All things being equal, Ralph was right and it’s fantastic long-term planning from the trainer!

“Vimy is a lady from Yorkshire and the Yorkshire Cup would be a nice race to win for her, so it’s a good place to start him off.

“We don’t think he will be a ‘cup’ horse and ideally we will stay at a mile and a half. He’s not in the Gold Cup and we felt that would be too far for a four-year-old and if he was going to be that kind of horse we would try it next year.

“We just thought this was a nice place to start him and it then does give us options.”

Amiloc was last seen finishing a brave fourth in the Breeders’ Cup Turf at Del Mar and hopes are high he could now follow in the likes of Rebel’s Romance and Giavellotto, who have won this race in recent years before playing a major role on the global middle-distance scene.

“The back end of the year is what is all about,” continued Cooper. “You have races like the Hardwicke in the meantime, but we could go travelling again later in the year and the plan is to try to make him a Group One winner at some point.

“There’s a deep band of mile-and-a-half superstars at the moment when you think of Rebel’s Romance, Francis-Henri Graffard’s two horses (Calandagan and Daryz) and Minnie Hawk, so it’s going to be a very strong division, but hopefully he can play his part.”

While Amiloc is slated for middle-distance action this term, Roger Varian has Gold Cup dreams with his St Leger second Rahiebb, who returns a late later than planned having missed Chester’s Ormonde Stakes following the ground issues on the Roodee last Thursday.

Varian said: “It’s still a nice race for him and the track will suit him. He heads there in good form and might just tighten for the run, but we’re very happy with his condition, very happy with how he has developed over the winter and looking forward to running him.

“We hope he can continue to progress and it is very much a starting point and will help tell us where we go next.

“However, he is a horse we’re really looking forward to and one we’re hoping can become a strong ‘cup’ candidate for all those staying races throughout the year.”

Bringing match-fitness to the table is Tom Clover’s Al Nayyir, who was third in the Dubai Gold Cup in March and has run well on the Knavesmire twice previously.

“He trained nicely through the winter and he looks well now having trained nicely through the spring,” said Clover.

“He won well in the Nad Al Sheba and shaped with plenty of promise in the Dubai Gold Cup and hopefully with a smooth run round, he can have a chance of being in the frame and he goes there in good shape.”

A length adrift of Al Nayyir in fifth at Meydan on World Cup Night was David O’Meara’s Epic Poet, while a field of seven is completed by Andrew Balding’s pair of Further and Tarriance and Jessica Bedi’s Deira Mile.