Dubai: The Mighty Madjani's trainer Gillian Duffield is anxious as she awaits the start of the Kahayla Classic at 5.00pm tomorrow when her horse bids to write a piece of Dubai World Cup day history.
Owned by Shaikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Dubai Deputy Ruler and Minister of Finance, Madjani has won the premier Group 1 race for Purebred Arabian horses over the last three runnings to equal the great Alanudd's (Unchained Melody) feat between 1997, '98 and '99.
Good shape
Duffield, who has also won this race with Kaolino in 2004, said Madjani was in good shape after doing a gallop on Saturday.
"It will be an amazing feat if he wins. For any horse to win it four times is incredible," said Duffield.
"I always like the big day but I am also a bit anxious. Hoping nothing goes wrong between now and the start of the race," she told Gulf News yesterday.
Madjani came back after a shock defeat to locally-bred Dynamite in the HH President's Cup (Group 1) to score an impressive win in the Maktoum Challenge on Super Thursday.
"He came back strongly and his time in the Maktoum Challenge was 2:12 (hand-timed) which was better than Djelmila's track record of 2:12.70. It is a fast track and we can expect another fast run on Saturday," said the leading Purebred Arabian horse trainer in the UAE.
Commenting on the presence of some classy rivals like Mizzna and Kandar Du Falgas, Duffield said: "They sure will be looking for a chink in his armour! Madjani finished ahead of Kandar Du Falgas on Super Thursday. Mizzna is a good filly and ran a very good race last year in the Kahayla. It is a strong field."
While Madjani will be going for a fourth successive win, Duffield will also be creating a mark, which will take some beating. She has won the last four runnings of this event, thrice through Madjani and once on Kaolino in 2004 and a win tomorrow will make it five-in-a-row. For Shaikh Hamdan, one of the leading Purebred Arabian horse owners, it is already six wins out of 12 runnings of this $250,000 (Dh940,000) race, which is only second in prize money to the HH The President's Cup run on turf in Abu Dhabi.
