Ryedale trainers on raiding trip to Ascot Champions meet

O’Meara is set to saddle his star speedster G Force in the £350,000 Qipco Champions Sprint as the colt seeks a second successive Group 1 victory, and will also be represented by prolific winner Custom Cut in the £1 million Qipco Queen Elizabeth II Stakes, in which Ellison aims to run Top Notch Tonto, who finished a remarkable runner-up last year.

Ellison will also saddle Baraweez, twice a winner for his Norton trainer in Ireland this season, in the £250,000 Balmoral Handicap.

G Force is the favourite for his chosen target, which was selected in preference to the recent Prix de l’Abbaye at Longchamp, which O’Meara won in any case with 31-1 outsider Move In Time.

“This race is worth more money for a start,” says the Nawton trainer, explaining the reasons for choosing Ascot over Longchamp.

O’Meara also feels the Ascot test is a fairer one and the best horse on the day is more likely to win compared to Longchamp’s famous sprint, which is inclined to throw up surprises and hard luck stories.

Winner of the Betfred Sprint Cup at Haydock in early September, a performance which came hot on the heels of an unlucky fourth-placed effort in York’s Nunthorpe Stakes the previous month, G Force will again be tackling six furlongs on Saturday.

“He’s in good form,” reports O’Meara, who has travelled an awful long way this season with the three-year-old.

Bought for only 25,000 guineas from owners Qatar Racing at last autumn’s Newmarket Sales after a promising sole outing as a juvenile, he has since developed into a top-notch performer. A son of the exceptionally talented Flanders, previously trained by Tim Easterby, G Force has every chance of becoming even better next season when more mature.

“There’s every suggestion that could happen,” says O’Meara. “If so, he could dominate the six-furlong division. With Slade Power (the current champion) going off to stud, the opportunity will be there.”

For the moment, G Force needs to dominate at Ascot. He promises to take all the beating in a race in which Richard Fahey will saddle his tough-as-teak Alben Star. Custom Cut, O’Meara’s other Champions Day raider, has won his last five races and is described by his trainer as “the most admirable little horse”.

Winner of two Listed events, two Group 3s and the Group 2 Joel Stakes, the four-year-old, previously based in Ireland, is on a high.

“I don’t know if horses thrive on confidence, but he has never looked back since he started winning,” says O’Meara. “He’s versatile tactically and he looked a Group 1 horse when he won the Desmond Stakes (at Leopardstown in August). Soft ground won’t bother him at all.”

Soft ground is a must for Top Notch Tonto. The flashy-coloured chestnut ran the race of his life in last year’s QEII when chasing home Olympic Glory after being supplemented for the race for a fee of £70,000. In finishing second, he picked up a prize of almost £228,000.

The four-year-old has yet to win this year, but he has run some fine races in defeat, not least on his last two starts.

“He was beaten a short head at York and then finished fourth, only beaten a couple of lengths in a Group 2 race at Leopardstown,” says Ellison. “He had been slow to come to hand this year, but those races were more like it and I would go as far as to say, he’s even better than he was at this time last year.”

As for Baraweez, he has already done Ellison proud this season. Formerly trained in France by Freddie Head, the four-year-old has won major handicaps at Galway and Leopardstown. An even bigger pot awaits him on Saturday when his rivals will include the Fahey-trained duo Heaven’s Guest and Gabrial’s Kaka and the John Quinn-trained Levitate, who will relish the expected testing conditions.

• MATTMU finally got his place in the sun at York’s closing meeting of the season on Saturday when clinching a Listed-race triumph in decisive style.

The Tim Easterby-trained juvenile, a Haydock and Chester winner earlier in the season, had finished third to Bond’s Girl in the £300,000 Weatherbys Hamilton Insurance Stakes at Doncaster in September and had chased home the classy Limato in the Redcar Two-Year-Old Trophy, taking a runner-up prize of more than £44,000.

The Rockingham Stakes on Knavesmire presented Mattmu with a good chance to resume winning ways and he turned the tables on Bond’s Girl in stylish fashion in the hands of David Allan to add another £25,000 to his prize money haul.

Easterby said: “He’s a good, tough horse and he goes next to France for a Group 2 race at Maisons-Laffitte so long as it’s soft ground.”

Richard Fahey, trainer of Bond’s Girl, had good reason to have mixed emotions about his results on the final two days’ racing at York in 2014.

He scored on Friday with ultra-consistent sprinter Arctic Feeling, who provided his regular apprentice rider Sammy-Jo Bell with her 10th winner of the campaign to equal her total score for last year, and followed up with 25-1 shot Imishvalla, ridden by 5lb claimer Jack Garrity the following day.

But he also saw four of his horses fill the runner-up slot, which is also the position he occupied in the York trainers’ championship, which went to David O’Meara for the second successive year.

Fittingly, O’Meara won the final race of the York season with Open Eagle,who duly provided his number-one jockey Danny Tudhope with his 100th winner of the campaign.

Tudhope can also claim to be the last jockey to ride a winner at York out of the ‘old’ weighing-room.

Come next May and the restart of racing at the county’s premier course, York will boast a brand new weighing-room complex, situated alongside the parade ring.

• GEORGE CHALONER may have missed out on York’s final days’ racing this season, but the Ryedale apprentice made his presence firmly felt at Musselburgh where he rode two winners and left himself on the threshold of a notable achievement.

Chaloner, successful on Our Boy Jack at Ayr earlier in the week, completed a double for his boss, Richard Fahey, on his latest Scottish venture aboard Henrythenavigator and Zuhoor Baynoona to leave himself just one winner shy of losing his 3lb claim and joining the ranks of fully fledged jockeys.

Megan Carberry’s love affair with Ayr, meanwhile, continued last week when she took her tally at the course this season to six winners from 15 mounts – a strike-rate of 40 per cent - and produced a monumental shock into the bargain.

The Norton apprentice rode an 80-1 winner in the shape of Royal Regent, trained by Lucy Normile, who also gave her the leg-up on 11-2 winner Royal Duchess.

Riding honours, however, went to Malton-based Jason Hart, who completed a treble on Lord Buffhead (14-1), Fredericka (100-30) and Rockweiller (11-2). Last year’s champion apprentice, also successful on Lord Franklin at Nottingham the previous day, is now up to 44 winners for the season.

• DEEPLY saddened to report the death this week, at the age of 68, of Alan Amies, who lived near Sheriff Hutton and who was a top race-reader who spent 35 years with Raceform as the doyen of the northern press room.

Amies, who won the Racing Journalist of the Year award in 2000, had since transferred his honed skills to Hong Kong. Hugely popular and highly respected, Alan will be greatly missed by all who had the pleasure to know him.