Aidan O’Brien readies Paddington and Cairo for first Irish classic of 2023

Aidan O’Brien has indicated he will be represented by Paddington and Cairo in this Saturday’s opening Curragh classic of 2023, the Tattersalls Irish 2000 Guineas.

O’Brien holds a record 11 victories in the race but the last of them was Churchill six years ago and the champion trainer has been out of Guineas luck in England and France already this season.

“Paddington and Cairo are probably the two main ones, that’s what we are thinking at the moment,” O’Brien said on Sunday. “Paddington won the Tetrarch very nicely so we’re looking forward to him. It’s his first step up to Group One company and we’re very happy with him.”

O’Brien added that Mediate, sixth to Mawj at Newmarket, will try and add to his record 10 successes in the Irish 1000 Guineas. She may be joined by Jackie Oh who would need to be supplemented at Tuesday’s acceptance stage.

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The shape of both classics will become clearer then with Joseph and Donnacha O’Brien also set to hold leading chances in the 2000 Guineas through Al Riffa and Proud And Regal respectively.

Classics apart, the Ballydoyle team have been in winning form, and it continued at the weekend with Warm Heart successful in an Oaks trial at Newbury on Saturday while The Antarctic topped an O’Brien hat-trick at Naas on Sunday.

Last year’s Middle Park runner-up narrowly got the better of Ocean Quest in the Group Three Lacken Stakes with the latter compromising her chance by drifting across the track.

The winner got 10-1 quotes for the Commonwealth Cup afterwards, to cement the Naas programme’s billing as Royal Ascot Trials Day. What The Antarctic’s specific Ascot target might be, though, isn’t certain.

“We have a choice at Ascot. Little Big Bear is going to run next week, over six at Haydock, and he [The Antarctic] would have the option of going to the Jersey over seven if Little Big Bear went to the Commonwealth Cup.

“This horse is going to come forward again, he’s still a little bit tubby but he’s coming. It will depend on where Little Big Bear goes,” O’Brien said.

Earlier River Tiber had to work harder than expected to justify 2-9 odds in a conditions race but ultimately did enough to keep him favourite for the Coventry Stakes next month.

The strength in depth of Donnacha O’Brien’s juvenile team was underlined by Porta Fortuna’s own Group Three success in the Coolmore Sprint. She was cut to 6-1 by some firms to repeat Meditate’s feat last year by progressing from this to land the Albany at Ascot.

Ladies Church has the King’s Stand as her Ascot target after smoothly landing the Sole Power Stakes for trainer Johnny Murtagh. The latter rode Sole Power to win the King’s Stand 10 years ago.

Michael Halford and Tracey Collins had their first success under their joint licence as the Cosmic Vega took the Listed Owenstown Stakes.

Sunday’s action came on the back of an uncomfortable statistical spotlight for the sport after confirmation that more than 1,000 horses have sustained fatal injuries on Irish tracks over the last decade. The Irish Horseracing Regulatory Board (IHRB) said on Sunday it is carrying out a “comprehensive project” to examine the factors behind data it provided to RTÉ Radio’s This Week which showed there were 1,060 horse fatalities on racecourses in Ireland between the years 2012 and 2022.

Other figures illustrated a higher fatality rate in this country compared to Britain between 2017 and 2021. The average percentage of fatalities to runners was 0.3 per cent in Ireland. It was 0.2 per cent cross-channel.

The IHRB told RTÉ that safety and welfare, for horses and people, is its priority and that identifying risk factors is part of its data examination.

The sport’s ruling body, Horse Racing Ireland, said that some element of risk in the sport is “unavoidable”. It added: “There are many factors involved, some are horse specific such as rating, gender history. Also, there are risk factors which [are] area race-specific such as ground conditions, distance, race type, pace of race and others which influence different results. All factors are examined and mitigation implemented.”

Welfare issues also came under the spotlight at Saturday night’s Preakness Stakes meeting in the US after the Bob Baffert-trained National Treasure landed the second leg of the Triple Crown in Pimlico.

On the undercard, Baffert-trained Havnameltdown had to be euthanised after breaking down during a Grade Three race. Baffert, who won a record eighth Preakness with National Treasure, said he was “devastated” at the loss. The fatality came on the back of eight horses dying in the week leading up to the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs earlier this month.