Speaking exclusively with BOYLE Sports , top trainer Charlie Johnston has looked ahead to the Ebor Meeting at York , the yard's home Festival on the Knavesmire .
Johnston has hailed York as Yorkshire 's equivalent of Newmarket , Ascot and Goodwood , and revealed that a small but select team of around ten will represent the stable across the four days.
The Middleham handler has detailed his big-race hopes, including Align The Stars in the £500,000 Ebor Handicap for local owner Tony Farmer , the plans for Venetian Lace , and why Vincenzo Peruggia has missed the cut.
The Home Festival
How Highly Do You Rate the York Festival?
It is our nearest big Festival track and Yorkshire 's equivalent of Newmarket , Ascot and Goodwood . It is very much our home tie. There are four summer festivals, and they are those four which come at three-week intervals through the summer. York is very much up there. They deserve all the praise that they get. It is a track that does everything so well. They have done a fantastic job.
On the racing front, the prize money is fantastic, minimum £100,000 a race for the entire meeting. Generally, the owners are all very positive about their experiences. From a general racegoer's point of view, it's a well laid out, fun, enjoyable racecourse to be at. Going back five or ten years, it would certainly have been considered a slightly poor relation to those other three festivals. Now I think it is arguably the second biggest behind Ascot . It works well from a financial business point of view, but at the same time they know they need those customers to keep coming back in numbers. So, you need to make sure that they leave there satisfied having had a good customer experience.
What Sort of Team Are You Taking?
I think we will be light numerically. We'll probably have about ten across the four days. Because of the competitive nature of the meeting and given the prize money is so good, nearly every race almost is a full field. So, the racing is hugely competitive, and as a result it's not a meeting that you send horses to make up the numbers. You've got to go there with horses that you think have a live chance. As a result, we'll have a fairly small but select team, but I'd like to think that everything that we will send will be there on merit and with a reasonable chance.
Vincenzo Peruggia
Why Won't Vincenzo Peruggia Make the 7 In 7?
Vincenzo Peruggia won't go in the Sir Kevin Sinfield 7 In 7 now. He needed to win at Newmarket on Saturday to go to York , and he didn't. He's run at two of the previous big festivals in Ascot and Goodwood and came up a bit short. We felt he needed to step away from the big summer festival handicaps into something a little bit calmer to try and get back on the right track.
Sir Kevin is a northern man and played so long for the Leeds Rhinos and did so much for Rob Burrow . He is a local hero as well as a rugby hero involved in both league and union at the highest levels. He is someone I'd have a huge amount of respect for, and what he's done on and off the pitch, that's for sure.
Venetian Lace
Where Next For Venetian Lace?
Venetian Lace will possibly go in the Yorkshire Oaks . We got back on track at Goodwood . She ran poorly in the Oaks , but that was completely ground driven. I was quite happy to put a line through that and left Epsom very much set on going to the Pretty Polly . But there was a bit of a change of heart from the owners at the 11th hour, and they wanted her to go to the Falmouth at Newmarket , but in hindsight, that was the wrong decision and derailed our season a little bit. It would have been good to try her at a mile and a quarter in the Pretty Polly because we thought ten furlongs was likely to be her optimum trip.
So, we left Newmarket a bit in no man's land and had to try and get back on track quickly. I thought we did that to a large extent at Goodwood . We still left there thinking perhaps ten furlongs is going to prove to be her optimum. Where she goes next will be driven largely by ground and opposition. She's very much a fast ground filly. If the ground was fast at York and that caused a few of the other big names to pull out, then it might become the preferred choice. She's also in a Group 1 in Deauville on the Sunday of Ebor Week, which is a mile and a quarter rather than a mile and a half.
The trip is probably slightly better in France , but the ground is probably likely to be better at York . It'll be a case of weighing up the two options. She is also entered into the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe , but as yet I haven't given it much thought. But it is a possibility. She ran well in the Guineas and has shown herself to be a top-class filly.
The Ebor Handicap
What's Your Big Chance in the £500,000 Ebor?
Align The Stars will run. It has very much been his target for quite some time. He's owned by Tony Farmer , who is pretty local to York , and for Tony , the Ebor is his Derby . It is the race he'd love to win above all others. Just to have a runner in it means the world to Tony . He obviously won the Northumberland Plate , so he's probably won the next biggest northern staying handicap this year.
He ran at Goodwood , though I do worry slightly now that his age and the fact that he's now got a mark of 101 might mean two miles is maybe his optimum trip, over which he won the Northumberland Plate , rather than a mile and six furlongs. I also entered him in the Irish Cesarewitch , which could be a nice target for him after York . He's a tough, honest horse. He runs his race. There might be one or two in there a bit speedier and a bit better handicapped than him, but hopefully he'll give Tony a good run.
The winner getting a shot at the Melbourne Cup is an incentive, albeit Willie Mullins and the O'Briens are targeting it plenty. But for me, at the point that you could travel halfway around the world and a vet that's never set eyes on your horse before can tell you whether it's fit to run or not is a pretty scary position to put yourself in. I think you need to be very, very confident that the horse would vet clean to want to go all the way around the world. Most of the horses that you're thinking of sending over there are five-year-old horses that have spent most of their life running over a mile and six and two miles, so not many of them are too clean-limbed! I can't say it's a race that I particularly have on my wish list of races to win.
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