AUGUSTE RODIN can live up to his juvenile promise and can grab victory in the Betfred Derby (British Champions Series) (No Geldings) (1.30pm) at Epsom on Saturday afternoon.
Aidan O’Brien’s three-year-old, under Ryan Moore, can bounce back from his disappointing effort in the QIPCO 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket last month to land the Colt’s Classic at Epsom. The son of Deep Impact had been looked upon as a potential Triple Crown contender following his impressive victory as a two-year-old in the Vertem Futurity Trophy at Doncaster last October. He had been the winter Derby favourite and was similarly short for his seasonal return in last month’s mile Classic at Headquarters. Nothing though went right and having been bumped by stable-mate Little Big Bear and then having a troubled passage any hopes of landing the Triple Crown was gone. He eventually came home a massively disappointing 14th of 14 behind Chaldean and he clearly has lots of questions to answer ahead of his second Classic bid on the unique ups and downs of the Epsom challenge. But the Coolmore-owned colt is bred to be a top middle-distance performer and the Derby was likely to be his main chance of landing another Group One success, once he graduated away from mile contests – the distance he got well as a juvenile at Doncaster.
His trainer O’Brien – who has already won the Derby a record eight times – still has great faith in Auguste Rodin and that should provide punters with similar hope that he can indeed get back on track and land the world’s greatest Flat race. If there are any lasting issues with Auguste Rodin, it may be the Charlie Appleby-trained Military Order – from Coolmore’s great rivals Godolphin – who could take advantage. He looks very solid based on his victory in the Linfield Derby Trial, which his full brother Adayar was second in before landing the Derby two years ago – although that was on Turf with Military Order triumphing on the all-weather track.
