Colin Keane has first classic ride in new role aboard André Fabre runner in French Oaks
Colin Keane has his first classic ride as first jockey to the powerful Juddmonte operation when teaming up with Better Together in Sunday's French Oaks.
The €1 million Longines Prix De Diane will have Ireland's champion jockey come under the eagle eye of France's most successful ever trainer, André Fabre.
The 79-year-old maestro, sometimes referred to as racing's Little Napoleon, has been known to be quite a taskmaster. Pat Eddery once nominated Fabre as a particularly difficult trainer to ride for.
Eddery was the first retained jockey for the late Prince Khalid Abdullah's Juddmonte team almost 40 years ago, and earlier this week it was confirmed Keane is filling a similarly expansive European role. It is already making for a busy schedule.
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Having ridden work on some Royal Ascot contenders in Newmarket on Wednesday morning, he rode a double at Limerick that evening. On Thursday, he was in Newbury and rode in Cork on Friday evening. He has four rides in Sandown on Saturday before heading to Chantilly.
Keane's sole Group One victory in France to date was on Broome in the 2021 Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud and he is relatively inexperienced around Chantilly.
André Fabre at Sandown Park, England, in April. Photograph:Better Together was ridden by Alexis Pouchin to win a Listed and a Group Three before finishing fifth in last month's French Guineas.
That contest could hold the key to the Diane outcome with the English filly, She's Perfect, controversially disqualified from first in favour of Zaragina, going in search of classic compensation.
'I just think it's the right race for her, basically we had the option between the Diane and the Coronation,' said She's Perfect's trainer, Charlie Fellowes. 'We want her to win the right race – it has nothing to do with the fact that it is in France, it was very plain and simple, I'm convinced this is the right race to run her and I just hope she will prove me right on Sunday.'
A field of 12 lines up for the prestigious classic where the red-hot Aidan O'Brien runs both Bedtime Story (Ryan Moore) and Merrily, the mount of last weekend's Epsom Derby hero, Wayne Lordan. The race is off at 3.05pm Irish time and is on Sky.
Moore memorably got the luck of the draw in the Prix Du Jockey Club a fortnight ago on Camille Pissarro but is now berthed widest of all on Bedtime Story. She ran sixth in the Pouliches, where Merrily was last.
Ryan Moore aboard Bedtime Story wins the Chesham Stakes at Royal Ascot last year. Photograph:O'Brien won the French Oaks four years ago with Joan Of Arc and his current streak of classic success means Bedtime Story won't be dismissed by anyone despite her draw.
The Irish man is chasing a third French classic this season on the back of Henri Matisse also winning the 2000 Guineas at Longchamp. O'Brien completed the Oaks-Derby double at Epsom last week and won the Irish 1000 Guineas with Lake Victoria.
Keane will also ride Juddmonte's Latakia in the following Listed contest (4.25pm) for trainer Francis Henri Graffard.
The Irish man's new post looks to have thrown open the race to be champion jockey in Ireland this year.
Billy Lee has been runner-up to Keane for the last three years, including being edged out by just three winners (92-89) in 2022. He has been made an odds-on favourite (8/11) by Paddy Power to take advantage of his rival's absences.
Before Friday evening's action, Billy Lee trailed his rival Colin Keane 36 to 30 and has four rides at Gowran on Sunday. Photograph:Prior to Friday evening's action, Lee trailed Keane 36 to 30 and has four rides at Gowran on Sunday.
The weekend action in Ireland and Britain is marked by a relative lull before next week's Royal Ascot extravaganza, where Aidan O'Brien is favourite to once again be crowned leading trainer.
He has won the award eight times in the last decade and is closing in on a remarkable century of winners at the world-famous meeting. O'Brien has 91 career successes there; his best individual haul in a week was seven winners in 2016.
O'Brien has a record nine victories in the Gold Cup, including an unprecedented four-timer for Yeats. The retirement of his former dual-champion Kyprios has opened the door to a new staying star and next Thursday's field will come from 10 possibles left in at Friday's acceptance stage.
They include Ballydoyle's potential next top-notcher, Illinois, a winner at Chester last time, although he is likely to face a formidable French challenger in Candelari, a Group One victor at Longchamp on his last start.
National Hunt action once again dominates this weekend's domestic programme with Downpatrick racing back-to-back. Up to 12mm of rain is forecast in advance of Saturday's card.
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Irish Times
3 hours ago
- Irish Times
Jack Conan: ‘Any season where you win something can never be deemed a failure'
It's been a whirlwind week for Jack Conan and the Leinster contingent in the British & Irish Lions squad. Their URC title-winning celebrations carried on into Sunday whereupon they were packing their bags and linking up with the rest of the squad on Monday, albeit the Lions had helpfully come to Dublin for the week. Jack Conan was among the 10 Leinster players obliged to take something of a back seat before watching last night's tour warm-up against Argentina in the Aviva Stadium. This day last week, after Conan captained Leinster to a 32-7 win over the Bulls, already feels like an age ago. 'It was a bit weird in the changing room after,' reflected Conan, 'like we didn't know how to win. Lads were a bit awkward or something like that, but it was good craic. 'We went to the RDS for a bit which was good, and then just pottered into town, and everyone did their own thing.' READ MORE The debate rages as to whether Leinster's season can be deemed a success or failure, and Conan gave a balanced perspective on this conundrum. 'I think any season where you win something can never be deemed a failure. Obviously, we want to go well in both competitions, and I think if it hadn't been for the performance against Northampton, even if we had lost that game, but we performed really well, I don't think people would have said much about it. Lions Jack Conan. Photograph: Billy Stickland/Inpho 'They're a quality side, but I think it was just the way we didn't show up that day, and had a bit of a hangover for a few weeks. Maybe we don't get the result over the last two weeks, if it wasn't for that game. Maybe it was the bit of a kick that we needed. 'The problem is when you win most of the time, it papers over cracks a little bit, so we had to have a good hard look at ourselves and it was tough for a lot of lads, for everyone in the building. But you get to win a trophy at Croke Park with all your mates, at the end of the day, I would have taken then. 'I definitely wouldn't say it was a failure, but there's definitely some more in this club and more in the lads, so hopefully there'll be a few years still ahead of us.' At least the squad also had Sunday together to continue their celebrations in their last day together as a group given departures and retirements. With age comes wisdom, and Conan was home 'early' on Sunday night ahead of hooking with the Lions. 'I felt fresh enough on Monday morning. I had to go down to Bray at 7 o'clock in the morning to get the dog,' he said. 'The afterglow went pretty quickly on Monday morning when you had to pack up for the next eight weeks of your life, and get organised and do everything else and get into camp. The anxiety was pretty high, like first day of school going in. The lads had the time together, so you feel you're behind the eight-ball a bit, so you're on catch-up.' Leinster's Jack Conan is presented with the URC trophy. Photograph: Laszlo Geczo/Inpho He'd love to have been playing last night but instead was with Andrew Porter, Joe McCarthy, Jamison Gibson-Park and Hugo Keenan, as well as the Bath duo of Will Stuart and Finn Russell and the Leicester pair of Ollie Chessum and Jack van Poortvliet in the UCD Bowl hosting a training session for 90 girls and boys ranging from eight to 12 years. The four primary schools nominated by the Irish provinces were Moorefields Primary School, Ballymena, Antrim (Ulster), St Columba's National School, North Strand, Dublin (Leinster), Clerihan National School, Clonmel, Tipperary (Munster) and St Brendan's National School, Eyrecourt, Galway (Connacht). Conan described last Tuesday's first proper training session as 'soul-searching stuff – we had to run out the demons.' He's been rooming with Jac Morgan. 'Great fella, nice bloke, so getting to know him. I need subtitles half the time, it's a strong Welsh accent.' 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'Everyone says it's just a different fanfare, a different level of excitement when you get properly on tour. But you can even see it walking around town at the moment; people in jerseys, there's a pop-up shop, so many kids outside the Shelbourne. It's special and I'm looking forward to getting a proper run-out at some stage.' Four years on, Conan also has a better idea of what to expect too. 'It's going to be the biggest game of their careers when you're playing the club sides. The Western Force are going to be unbelievably up for it. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for those blokes to play against the Lions. 'I know they might be missing a host of international stars but they're going to be unbelievably excited, so we know we'll have to be at our best. Every time you get an opportunity to put on this jersey it's only a very short amount of time you get to wear it you've got to make the most of it yourself and leave it in a better place. 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Irish Times
3 hours ago
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Ian O'Riordan: Why the record-breaking heights of Mondo Duplantis are truly out of this world
Somewhere, in the broken fragments of memory, there is a giant of a man throwing an unidentified object into the sky. Then, without warning, it comes crashing down into the black cinder infield, prompting a long 'whoa' from the crowd and a crackle from the old PA. 'Yuriy Sedykh … new world record!' There must be something indelible about witnessing your first world record, live and in person, as a 12-year-old. Even when it's in the field, not on the track. Like All-Ireland finals and Bob Dylan gigs, I've lost count of the number witnessed since, but that first sighting of Yuriy Sedykh in the hammer will always stand out. It was July 1984, down at Cork City Sports next to the Lee, and we were brought along by our dad on the strict condition we do not shout names at the runners. We didn't know a single thing about hammer throwing, or even care, but quickly realised that breaking a world record must be something extraordinary. READ MORE Yuri Sedykh, the Russian Olympic hammer throwing champion. Photograph: Fairfax Media Archives Sedykh may be a relic now of the old Soviet Union, but he is still remembered as the best at his event, with ample evidence of that in my essential handbook that is the Progression of World Athletics Records. Olympic champion in 1976 and 1990, he broke the hammer world record six times during his career, throwing 84.34m that evening in Cork . Some of the local Cork crowd would have understood perfectly what they were witnessing. Dr Pat O'Callaghan from Kanturk, Olympic hammer champion in 1928 and 1932 , broke the world record in 1937, throwing 59.56m in nearby Fermoy. Plenty more Irish hammer throwers, unable to represent their home country, did likewise, including John Flanagan, Matt McGrath, James Mitchel, and not forgetting Maurice Davin, the co-founder of the GAA , who threw a world record of 30.12m in 1881. Sedykh later extended his hammer world record to 86.74m, winning the 1986 European title in Stuttgart, and 39 years later that record still stands. His record-breaking spree was aided by fierce competition from fellow Soviet thrower Sergey Litvinov, but as time has passed, more questions have been raised about the legitimacy of those marks. Sedykh died in France in 2021, aged 66, and always denied allegations of doping. However, Russian doping whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov, in his 2020 book The Rodchenkov Affair, claimed that Sedykh was taking steroids, and most of his competitors were too. Sweden's Armand Duplantis poses after setting a new world record of 6.28m in the men's pole vault event. Photograph: TT News Agency/AFP via Getty Images Despite being treated to several world records in all the years since, and some more believable than others, few athletes have come close to rivalling the actual feat of the last world record I witnessed live and in person: the pole vault height of 6.25m that Swedish superstar Mondo Duplantis cleared to win the Olympic gold medal in Paris last August. The original Olympic motto of Citius, Altius, Fortius was first adopted in the main at the 1924 Olympics in Paris, and in the century since, few athletes have perfected the higher part better than Duplantis. He's broken that record height again three times since Paris, clearing 6.26m at the Silesia Diamond League in Poland just three weeks later, then clearing 6.27m at the Clermont-Ferrand indoor meeting in France in February. Then last Sunday at the Stockholm Diamond League, inside the old 1912 Olympic Stadium, Duplantis cleared 6.28m at his first attempt, making it world record number 12 for the 25-year-old, with the obvious promise of more to come. Armand Duplantis of Team Sweden jumping 6.28 to set a new world record. Photograph:'There's not much between me and 6.30m, technically, I'm just a perfect day away from it,' Duplantis said. 'The first time I jumped in this stadium when I was 11 years old, it was rainy and cold, and I jumped right under four metres – quite high for how young I was.' Crucially, Duplantis passed the first rule of being successful in any sport: choosing your parents wisely. His father Greg won several US pole vault titles, with a best of 5.80m, and his mother Helena, from Sweden, was a top heptathlete and volleyball player. They met while attending Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Born in Lafayette, Duplantis chose to represent Sweden from an early age. Although showing equal promise in baseball, and recently championing the benefits of playing multi-sports as a youngster, he soon concentrated solely on the pole vault, coached by his father and mother, who set up a practice runway and mat at their home. He started clearing age group world bests every year between the ages of seven and 12, most of which still stand. In 2015, at 16, he cleared 5.30m to win the World Under-18 title in Colombia, and then in 2020, cleared 6.17m to break his first world record, improving the mark held since 2014 by one of his idols, Renaud Lavillenie from France. Armand Duplantis of Team Sweden jumping 6.28 to set a new world record. Photograph:He's won two Olympic titles since, five World titles, between indoors and out, plus four European titles. In April, he was named Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, after four previous nominations − just the second track or field athlete to land that honour after four-time winner Usain Bolt. Such is his perfect combination of strength, speed and agility, Duplantis can use longer, stiffer poles designed for heavier vaulters. He explained the benefits of that to the New York Times, saying the catapult effect it creates is like 'a pea on a plastic spoon that's shooting across a cafeteria'. As for his coolness on the run-up, and his ability to make the ridiculously hard appear so utterly sublime, he said: 'I take a deep breath, think about what I'm going to do… and then I go and do it.' Looking back through the Progression of World Athletics Records, few athletes have ever matched the rate of Duplantis, in any event. What sets him apart, however, is that there is no reason whatsoever to doubt his progression, that he is truly extraordinary, and that witnessing his world records will never grow old.
Irish Times
10 hours ago
- Irish Times
Lions v Argentina player ratings: Bundee Aki shows his strength, Fin Smith has a shaky start
Marcus Smith: Scrambled well for a kicked through ball at the end of the first half but wasn't always solid under the high kicks. Caught out of position and didn't read the threat when Santiago Cordero scored his second-half try. 5 Tommy Freeman: Kept busy coming in from the wing and hungry for work from the beginning. Some clever running lines too. Picked it up in the second half and showed what a real live wire he can be at this level. 7 Sione Tuipulotu: Showed his strength going forward for his disallowed try and was always a threat going forward in the carry. Some handling errors and scrappy offloads and an excellent try saving tackle at the end of the first half. 6 Bundee Aki: He was selected for his strength and ability to gain yards in traffic. His first half try was just that as he muscled over with three players around him. Gave way for Elliot Daly in the second half. 6 READ MORE Duhan van der Merwe: He was a mixed bag in the first half, hitting rucks and a great one-handed pass to Tommy Freeman early on. Was an early threat but was turned over going forward for the Albornoz try before half-time. 5 Fin Smith: Shaky start with a few missed high balls but grew into a game that was frantic at times and also disconnected. A busy player but perhaps not as controlling and influential as he would have liked. 5 Alex Mitchell: Provided a good service after box kicking at the beginning which wasn't always profitable. A super one-handed defensive pass to Freeman. Seemed rushed at times moving the ball forward. Replaced after half-time by Williams. 5 Alex Mitchell seemed rushed at times moving the ball forward. Photograph:Ellis Genge: Crushed a few scrums in the first half where the Lions earned three penalties. Good energy too from the loose head prop who trucked some hard yards before giving way to Schoeman after an hour. 6 Luke Cowan-Dickie: Showed great strength for his disallowed try in the first half. Was very active around the park with a few missed lineout throws. Showed good energy while he was on before Ronan Kelleher replaced him early in the second half. 6 Finlay Bealham: Was solid in the scrums and involved around the pitch in a frantic first half. Showed himself to be valuable around the park and in the set piece. Will be pleased with his 59 minutes before Tadhg Furlong came in. 6 Maro Itoje: Quiet enough first half and himself and Cowan Dickie didn't quite get the lineout timing early in the match. Controlled the lineout maul well for the Lions penalty try early in the second half. 5 Tadhg Beirne ran a great line for his try in the first half. Photograph: Billy Stickland/Inpho Tadhg Beirne: Never afraid of the grunt work and ran a great line for his try in the first half, taking the ball from a hard flat pass by replacement Tomos Williams. Great lineout take at the end but Lions just off their game to capitalise. 6 Tom Curry: One of the players that showed from the beginning taking up the ball and hitting back Argentina players. Took a few lineouts too. Turned up on the day but a disjointed overall performance negated some of his work. 7 Jac Morgan: Got involved in everything early in the game and won an important runover in the first half that could have been a try. Probably didn't show as much as he is capable of in a frustrating first half. Replaced by Henry Pollo ck 49 minutes in. 6 Ben Earl: Took early carries and showed visibility throughout the first half. He was one of the more solid Lions performers, taking the ball on and curbing the errors that had frustrated Lions efforts. 7 [ Lions left to rue missed chances as Argentina win in Dublin Opens in new window ] Andy Farrell: Spoke about connections during the week and the difficulty of glueing a team together that had not much time to work out each other's way of playing. That disconnect was on show, especially in a frustrating first half. 6 Replacements: Several players made an impact when they came on including Tomos Williams and Mack Hansen who took the ball on several times. Ultimately they didn't get it over the line with plenty of late possession and territory. 6 Which Ireland players will step up for the summer squad while the Lions are away? Listen | 27:53
