Twice Over got first run on Vision d’Etat as the enterprising
tactics employed by Tom Queally gave the winning 4-year-old son of
Observatory his second successive victory in the Group 1, $602,000
Champion Stakes, the last that will be run over Newmarket’s straight 10
furlongs.
Twice Over’s victory also capped a famous double for his owner
Khalid Abdullah and his trainer Henry Cecil, as well as for Queally,
the trio having combined to produce Dewhurst Stakes winner Frankel 45
minutes earlier.
The 7-2 winner was always traveling in cruise control as he tracked
a pedestrian pace set by Arlington Million winner Debussy. Twice Over
assumed command approaching the two-furlong marker as Olivier Peslier
was caught a bit flat footed aboard the 3-1 favorite Vision d’Etat, who
chased the winner to the line without ever threatening to reel him in.
Twice Over emerged a 1 3/4-length winner with Vision d’Etat taking
second by three-quarters of a length from Debussy. Team Valor’s Gitano
Hernando was up for fourth by the same margin over Arlington’s
Secretariat Stakes runner-up Wigmore Hall.
The two disappointments of the race were Prix du Moulin de Longchamp
winner Fuisse, who came home seventh, and Queen Elizabeth II Stakes
winner Poet’s Voice, who was ninth. Both were running beyond a mile for
the first time in their careers, and both failed to stay the mile and a
quarter, for which Twice Over was timed in 2:08.54 on good to soft
ground.
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