Alex Hammond: Let’s Dancealot!

Sky Sports HQ’s Alex Hammond hopes her good form continues this weekend as she looks ahead to Doncaster and Cheltenham.

As we’ve seen in the past, the cream rose to the top at Ascot on Champions Day – what were your personal highlights?

I thought Champions Day was an unreserved success. It has really grown over the six years since its inception and with the drier autumn we have enjoyed so far, conditions were superb too. I think my highlight was probably the same as almost everyone else’s. Almanzor was superb in the Champion Stakes and justified trainer Jean-Claude Rouget’s decision to bypass the Arc. He franked the form with runner-up Found from the Irish Champion Stakes beating her comprehensively again and stamping his authority on the three-year-old colt’s division this season. Taking nothing away from the Arc winner, she put up another gutsy performance but she was beaten by an exceptional horse in Almanzor over the mile and a quarter trip.

There is plenty of stamina on the dam’s side of his pedigree so there is the option to step up to a mile and a half next season, with the Arc his ultimate aim. He has now won eight of his 10 starts and I can’t wait to see him as a four-year-old; he’s already 4/1 favourite with Sky Bet to win the 2017 Arc which is at Chantilly again which will suit this year’s French Derby winner.

I have to give a ‘nb’ to Minding who proved her versatility and exceptional talent in winning the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes. She was dropping back to a mile for the first time since finishing runner up in the Irish 2000 Guineas in May, one of just two defeats for her this season for which there were well documented reasons (she banged her head in the stalls resulting in a nasty cut). She is another true champion to have lit up the Berkshire track on Saturday.

How do you weigh up Saturday’s Racing Post Trophy at Doncaster? Can anyone muscle in on Aidan O’Brien’s remarkable Group One dominance?

It’s not looking likely. O’Brien has three of the 10 runners in a bid to keep up his marvellous record in this race and as rumours suggested in the week Yucatan is Ballydoyle’s number one hope. Ryan Moore rides and in the absence of stablemate Capri (who beat him in the Beresford Stakes last time out) this colt and could go off odds-on favourite on the day. Pedigrees don’t come much better than Yucatan’s. He’s by supersire Galileo out of the top class mare Six Perfections, which makes him a full/half brother to two group/graded winners. All three of his starts to date have come over Saturday’s trip of a mile and everything points towards another Group One victory for O’Brien, who will no doubt have Bobby Frankel’s record of 25 top level winners in a year, in his sights. He has sent out 21 Group One winners so far and the Grade One win of Ivanovich …

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