Age Of Gold leads home 1-2 in Jumeirah Stakes

Age Of Gold translated some useful UK form to Meydan as he stayed on well to deny Hallasan in the Jumeirah Stakes on Friday, 3 January.

The Charlie Appleby-trained three-year-old had scored impressively on his debut at Yarmouth and was beaten a neck in a nursery handicap at York’s Ebor Festival, in addition to finishing seventh in Listed races at Royal Ascot and Haydock Park.

Dropping back to seven furlongs, Age Of Gold was rousted leaving the stalls and soon raced in mid-field on the outside of the 10 runners.

Age Of Gold moved up around the field to go second approaching the final quarter-mile, although Richard Mullen was made to work to collar a rallying The Fingal Raven over half a furlong from home.

Stable-mate Hallasan made late inroads to grab second in the closing strides but could not challenge Age Of Gold, who held on by a comfortable length and a quarter.

Charlie Appleby said: “Hallasan was the horse everyone thought was coming in here with the form but, to be fair to Age Of Gold, we thought a bit of him after he won on debut at Yarmouth.

“He went into the Chesham Stakes as second favourite but did not turn up that day. After we had him gelded, he ran another solid race at York but then threw the towel in again at Haydock.

“He has trained well out here. The pair of them have been going around together and it has been hard to split them. Hallasan probably has more natural pace, whereas this fella was always going to stay.

“It will be interesting to hear what Will [Buick] has to say about Hallasan. They went a pretty scorching gallop there and he probably would have preferred them to have gone steadier. He was working harder than anticipated but then did stay on well.

“They are both out here now and I would imagine they will step up to the mile for either the Jumeirah Guineas Trial or Al Rayyan Mile in Qatar.”

Richard Mullen said: “On homework, Will’s horse had the measure of Age Of Gold, but some horses don’t put it in at home and save themselves.

“Age Of Gold is a very genuine horse, who won first time out at Yarmouth and ran a real good race at York. I suppose you can put a line through his last run at Haydock – it was a messy race and he just didn’t show up.

“The plan was to let him roll along but they were going quick enough on the inside of me. I wanted to keep it as uncomplicated as I could without going too wide.

“He is quite behind the bridle in his races and is a bit of a grinder. He keeps battling and, once I got to the leader’s quarters, he ran all the way to the line.”