Ballydoyle stars So You Think and Await The Dawn are among 15 pre-entries for the Breeders’ Cup Classic on Saturday week.
So You Think touched down on European soil having carried all before him in Australia, but while he has since won four times, including three Group Ones, the giant entire has also suffered three defeats.
He is set to take to the dirt surface for the first time at Churchill Downs.
Aidan O’Brien has also entered Await The Dawn, beaten at odds-on in the Juddmonte International at York, but connections have declared his first preference as the Breeders’ Cup Turf.
Uncle Mo, Gio Ponti and Havre De Grace are three of the better-fancied entries for the home team.
Joining Await The Dawn in the Breeders’ Cup Turf could be stable companion St Nicholas Abbey and Sir Michael Stoute’s beaten St Leger favourite Sea Moon.
Top-class mares Midday and Sarafina interestingly have the race as their first preference, with the Filly & Mare Turf, which the former won two years ago and was second 12 months later, second choice.
David Lanigan has entered Meeznah, but she is seemingly bound for the Breeders’ Cup Marathon for which Ballydoyle’s Harrison’s Cove and the Andre Fabre-trained Brigantin also hold an entry.
There are plenty of other likely European challengers in the Filly & Mare Turf, including Fabre’s Announce, Roger Varian’s Nahrain and O’Brien’s Misty For Me.
Goldikova will bring the house down if she can secure the Breeders’ Cup Mile title for a remarkable fourth successive year.
She will face a strong challenge from the Richard Hannon-trained Strong Suit, with Andre Fabre’s Byword and Ballydoyle’s Zoffany also booked for the trans-Atlantic jaunt.
O’Brien has Crusade and Daddy Long Legs engaged in the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile, with the latter in the Juvenile Turf as a second preference.
Also in the Juvenile Turf for the Europeans are Alan McCabe’s Caspar Netscher, Varian’s Farraaj and the O’Brien-trained pair of Learn and Wrote.
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