| 20 Apr
| Before getting to that let us consider the winner Art
Connoisseur who had a perfect path through the race. He sat in centre
field and held up just over 3 lengths off a taxing pace. That may not sound
a lot but that's 0.6 of second slower. If you spread that over the first
three furlongs he is only averaging, say, 11.8s furlongs to the leaders
11.6. That can be enough, depending upon cruising speed, efficiency, fitness,
etc. of the individual to break up the pacemakers and allow the tracker
to make a perfect jump to the lead. Which is what Art Connoisseur did here
to show some quickening ability to go past the leaders. But, his effort
was not just beating up on faders because he went past the leaders before
they had folded and showed a real change of pace.
It was a good performance and a comfortable win but not that high class
in actuality. It's a race you have to be careful about over-rating because
while the likes of Servoca, Ouqba & probably Icesolator
are likely to improve to prove better class they didn't perform to that
level here. Set your rating at that standard and you'll drag the ordinary
ones, and worse, in the field up to performance ratings they cannot achieve.
Michael Bell said afterwards that Art Connoisseur would have one more run
before Royal Ascot's Norfolk Stakes (5f). That will be in one of the Ascot
Conditions race (Garter Stakes on April 30th), the Listed National Stakes
(Sandown, May 30th) or the mid-May Windsor Conditions race. Asked to compare
him to his other better 5f 2yos with Hoh Mike & Nevisian Lad he put
him in the same category.
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![[Picture]](../../08_Publish_Pics/ArtConnoisseur_080617_asct1.jpg){kind=link}
