Owen Burrows is relishing the chance of running Massaat in the Group 1 2016 2000 Guineas at Newmarket’s Rowley Mile Racecourse on Saturday (30th April), less than two months after he saddled his very first runner as a trainer.
A top class field of 13 horses has been declared for this £500,000 event, which is both the first race in the 2016 QIPCO British Champions Series and the first British Classic of the season.
The QIPCO 2000 Guineas is the world’s top three-year-old race over the last decade, based on the average official handicapper’s rating of the first four horses to finish in each of its last ten renewals.
A former jump jockey who acted as assistant to the five-time 2000 Guineas-winning trainer, Sir Michael Stoute, for 12 years, 41-year-old Burrows recently took over the licence from Barry Hills to train at Kingwood House Stables in Lambourn.
Runner-up to Air Force Blue in the Group 1 Dubai Dewhurst Stakes over seven furlongs of the Rowley Mile in October, Massaat will again clash with the Dewhurst hero who, alongside Air Vice Marshal, is bidding to give Irish trainer Aidan O’Brien a record eighth 2000 Guineas success.
Other leading contenders include Buratino, the only horse to have beaten Air Force Blue when landing the Group 2 Coventry Stakes at Royal Ascot last June; Marcel, successful in October’s Group 1 Racing Post Trophy; and Stormy Antarctic, the brilliant last-to-first winner of the main trial, the Group 3 Novae Bloodstock Insurance Craven Stakes, over this course and distance a fortnight ago.
The QIPCO 2000 Guineas is just one highlight of a superb first day of the two-day QIPCO Guineas Festival which has also attracted outstanding fields for its other Pattern Races – the £100,000 Group 2 Dunaden At Overbury Jockey Club Stakes and the £60,000 Group 3 Pearl Bloodstock Palace House Stakes.
Contested over a mile and a half, the seven-runner Dunaden At Overbury Jockey Club Stakes features two Classic winners of 2015 - Simple Verse (St Leger) and Jack Hobbs (Irish Derby) - not to mention the dual Group 2 scorer, Big Orange, the Irish St Leger runner-up, Agent Murphy, and the fast-improving Group 3 Cumberland Lodge Stakes winner, Star Storm.
The Pearl Bloodstock Palace House Stakes has no less than 13 different Group Race scorers among its 22-strong field, including the winners of eight Group 1 events led by the popular veteran, Sole Power, who landed this prestigious six furlong contest in both 2013 and 2014.
“It’s extremely exciting to be contesting a Classic with only my tenth runner – I have to pinch myself to check that it’s true,” Burrows said.
“I have been very pleased with how Massaat has developed physically over the winter and, although we contemplated running him in a trial, once we looked at the timing of things we realised that it would be beneficial to go straight for the QIPCO 2000 Guineas.”
“He did a racecourse gallop at Newmarket at the Craven Meeting and then did a very nice piece of work last Friday, so I am confident that he is in good shape.”
“Air Force Blue beat him by three and a quarter lengths in the Dewhurst but the winner was match-hardened then, having already won a Group 1 and been to Royal Ascot, while Massaat was big and raw and was coming straight from a maiden race. I would like to think that we will at least be able to narrow the gap on Saturday.”
“It is hard to say what Massaat’s ideal trip will be at this stage, as he has such a good temperament and relaxes in his races, so I’m sure that he will get ten furlongs if we need him to. Paul [Hanagan, his jockey] is adamant that he has the speed needed to be competitive over a mile.”
“Good ground would be perfect for him but he won his maiden on good to soft so if it was good to soft again on Saturday I wouldn’t be too worried.”
The QIPCO 2000 Guineas is the opening race of the 2016 QIPCO British Champions Series.
