ARABIAN RACING 2004
BY PAUL SIMMONS
Newbury August 1st

Track: Good to Firm

The Emirates Arabian International Stakes (Group 2) Two Miles:
1. CS Al Wahed Mr. P Deymonaz
2. Juma E Ahern
3. Nadjel R Hills

Distances: 1, 11 3 ran Time: 03:51:41

Winner owned and bred by Mr. M Brunton. Trained by Mr. A J Brunton.

With only three runners this years Group 2 “Arabian Gold Cup” was always going to be a tactical affair and Eddie Ahern and Richard Hills were left looking embarrassed after letting CS Al Wahed – already a winner over two miles this season – gain a massive lead from the start. CS Al Wahed a known and dour stayer stole a huge advantage from the start and pretty much galloped his rivals into submission. After a mile and a quarter CS Al Wahed (Bengali D’Albret X Cikada (Klarnet)) was over eighteen lengths clear, but as the favourite Juma started to make a move to catch up from four furlongs out - the long time leader kept going. With three furlongs to go Juma was cruising and could be named the winner, Al Wahed was being hard driven by Pierre Deymonaz but when Eddie Ahern went to make his move two furlongs out on Juma the bay stallion had no answer and Al Wahed galloped all the way to the line to win his first Group race of his career by a length and a half. CS Al Wahed doesn’t know how to run a bad race and did all the donkey work setting a decent pace and deserved to win, he needs a stiff two miles to be seen at his best and ran out a ready winner; a credit to his recently deceased dam Cikada who was Champion race broodmare in 2002 & 2003. Michael Brunton has now owned and bred two Group winners this season and brother Tony has trained three Group winners and are in bang in form. Juma (Sambist X Jerba Du Paon) was slightly disappointing in second and seemed a little quirky in failing to quicken in the final furlong, but he had a hard race in the Dubai Stakes and was perhaps feeling the effects and is worth another chance. Nadjel (Djelfor X Super Nana (Tidjani)) totally spat his dummy out, trailing the field throughout and running a lifeless race, he was very disappointing and although he made inroads into the lead towards the end he wasn’t really interested in playing the game.