Dubai: Eoin Harty, Godolphin's former America-based trainer, has pronounced his Godolphin Mile hopeful Shamoan fresh and fit for Saturday's $5million race.
After watching his ward canter at the Nad Al Sheba Racecourse, yesterday morning, Harty said: "He's quite fit and is super fresh."
Shamoan will face the biggest challenge of his career when he takes on 11 rivals in the Group 2 race.
"I think he will have a good chance I wouldn't have brought him here otherwise," Harty said. "With his style of running and this being a one-turn mile, I think he'll do very well for himself."
Harty, who did some sterling work with Godolphin's juveniles in America and even produced 2002 Dubai World Cup winner Street Cry, said he will breeze Shamoan over 800 metres on Tuesday.
The four-year-old son of Monashee Mountain, purchased privately in Ireland for about $50,000, has earned more than six times that amount in nine American starts last year for owners Richard and Linda Laird of Del Mar, California.
Harty knows, as well as any American, how the track at Nad Al Sheba plays as he commanded the Grandstand Stables on the grounds during his two-year tenure with Godolphin.
Shamoan, who likes to rally from off the pace, was not placed in his only race of 2006, an allowance effort at 1 1/16 miles.
Harty blamed himself for the defeat, saying he backed up the gelding too soon only 19 days after a fourth-place finish in the Group 1 Malibu Stakes at Santa Anita Park on December 26.
He has now given Shamoan plenty of time to recover since the allowance disappointment and said the chestnut gelding travelled well to Dubai.
"It doesn't seem to faze him," Harty said of shipping. "He actually seems to enjoy it."
Harty pointed out that Shamoan defeated some fairly impressive runners on occasion, including Dubai World Cup (Group 1) competitors Wilko (in the Malibu) and Magna Graduate (in last year's Lone Star Derby (Group 3), in which Shamoan finished second).
"So, he's not a no-hoper," Harty said.
In addition, Shamoan will have the benefit of being ridden by John Velazquez, winner of the Eclipse Awards, as America's outstanding jockey for 2004-05 and the rider of last year's Dubai World Cup winner, Roses in May.
