Royal Mougins wins Gold Cup again

The last meeting before the midsummer break at Pardubice racecourse was held on good to soft ground on a cloudy but mild afternoon. These were ideal conditions for steeplechasing at the end of June.

The Chladek & Tintera Gold Cup, the most valuable race of the season on the oval track steeplechase course at Pardubice, was won for the third time in succession by Royal Mougins. He took the lead with a circuit to go, and was never likely to be caught. Mandarino finished well in second place, just three lengths behind, but the rest were left some way in the rear. Royal Mougins had been narrowly beaten recently in the Gran Corso Siepi D*Italie at Merano by Paracchini, but this was a convincing performance. Mandarino is also an interesting horse. He had finished 2nd in the First of May Steeplechase at Lysa, and then a close 2nd behind Tomis in the first Velka Pardubicka qualifying race at Pardubice at the end of May.

Baggio won the Pardubice Region Road Administration and Maintenance Prize, Cat II, 5200 metres impressively, and is exactly the kind of tough Polish-bred horse with good flat speed that could be a Velka Pardubicka contender as early as this October. He is entered for the race but has not yet qualified. 4-y-o Vana-trained Budapest, by Montjeu, bought to run in the 2008 Czech Derby, may have beaten nothing much in the last race of the afternoon, but he looks capable of winning much better races than this.

Jan Faltejsek rode two winners for Wrbna Racing/Cestmir Olehla, and has taken a narrow lead in the jumps jockeys* championship. Again, after the nine-race meeting at Pardubice, the jumps jockeys headed off for Merano, in northern Italy. Faltejsek took two second places there, but there were no Czech-trained winners.

I am pleased to report that Numero Due won the Petrzalka Grand Prix at Bratislava on Sunday. He seemed to have taken well to the Pardubice crosscountry course last year, finishing 4th in the Velka Pardubicka, but his two races at Pardubice this year have ended with him unseating his rider. This was a successful return to Slovakia, where Numero Due was voted the best chaser of the 2007 season. His rider Lubos Urbanek, back to fitness, now needs just one more win to gain his title of jockey, awarded to riders of 50 winners over fences.

Racing at Pardubice resumes on Saturday, August 22nd, when the feature
event will be the third VP qualifying race.