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Royal Mougins, owned by Jiri Charvat, trained by Frantisek Holcak and ridden by Jiri Kousek, won the Chladek & Tintera Gold Cup yet again at Pardubice on June 26th, his seventh win in seven races at Pardubice, all of which have been Listed races on the classical steeplechase course. He has won 18 of his 27 races over hurdles and fences, and is absolutely the outstanding Czech chaser of recent years. He races mainly in Italy, where he has won 5 Graded races. Royal Mougins is still only 8 years old, and we hope he will continue at the top.

Anyone who was looking forward to the race of the year in Prague in the Yoko Gold Cup in Sunday’s races leading up to the controversial Fortuna Czech Derby at Auto Hase Park Prague Velka Chuchle Racecourse is in for a big disappointment. Age of Jape, 2009 Horse of the Year in the Czech Republic and also in Slovakia, unbeaten in his last 12 races, has been scratched from the list of runners and has left the race for his challengers.

The second of the four Velka Pardubicka qualification races is the Paramo Grand Prix, Milos Svoboda Memorial, 5800 metres, crosscountry, which was run at Pardubice on June 12^th. To fit in with the football World Cup on television, the meeting began at 3 pm, and the main race was after 7 pm. This was just as well, as the heat of a very hot and humid afternoon had died down a little. After several hot days, the going was firm (officially, good to firm). 15 runners lined up.

Shamalgan, trained at Mimon by Arslangirej Savujev, is expected to run in the French Derby this weekend. Shamalgan finished 3rd as a complete outsider in the French Two Thousand Guineas, but his performance was impressive and his breeding suggests he may stay. Shamalgan's owner Ardak Amirkulov and trainer Savujev won top races in Germany with Darsalam a few years ago, and took the horse to run in the English St Leger at Doncaster, and then in the Ascot Gold Cup in the year when the royal meeting was run at York.