Blond Me bags E.P. Taylor success in Canada for Andrew Balding
By Racing TV
Last Updated: Tue 5 Dec 2023
Blond Me recorded a famous success for Andrew Balding and Oisin Murphy in the Grade One E. P. Taylor Stakes at Woodbine in Canada.
The five-year-old filly, who won the Middleton Stakes at York in May, was given a confident ride by Murphy - winning the second top-level event of his career after Aclaim in the Prix de la Foret last month - and swept into the straight full of running.
It did not take her long to get the better of a brief duel with Kitten's Roar as she stayed on strongly, despite hanging marginally to her right.
The Aidan O'Brien-trained Rain Goddess was never able to get in any sort of blow, trailing in last under Ryan Moore.
Bullards Alley was a shock 50-1 winner of the Pattison Canadian International Stakes at Woodbine racecourse on Sunday night, meaning O'Brien's wait to equal the world record for number of Grade/Group One wins in a year goes on.
The mark of 25 set by the late Bobby Frankel has long been threatened by O'Brien, who reached 23 victories in 2001 and 2008.
A Dewhurst Stakes 1-2-3-4 at Newmarket on Saturday led by US Navy Flag had put him one away from joining American great Frankel, and with Ryan Moore doing the steering, the four-year-old Idaho was well fancied to improve on his eighth place in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.
But the unheralded Bullards Alley, trained by Tim Glyshaw, did not read the script, coming off the home turn full of running and rocketing clear when asked the question by jockey Eurico Rosa Da Silva.
To his credit, Idaho stayed on down the straight to make late ground in fourth, just ahead of last year's winner Erupt, but in the final reckoning there was only one horse that mattered.
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