Racing: Stage set for Classic at St Ledger Festival

2:16pm Thursday 7th September 2006

York is set to host the final Classic of the 2006 British season - The Ladbrokes St Leger Stakes - on Saturday, second leg of the two-day Leger Festival, which has a temporary home on the Knavesmire this year while its usual venue, Doncaster, is undergoing redevelopment.

Friday is Ladies Day, a seven-race programme starting at 1.35pm, with a trio of Group 2 races, for good measure. The Flying Childers Stakes for leading two-year-old sprinters at 2.05pm could well fall to Kevin Ryan's Wi Dud.

Frankie Dettori holds claims aboard Godolphin's Guada-lajara in the Park Hill Stakes for fillies and mares, affectionately known as The Fillies St. Leger', at 2.40pm, while Frankie won't be far away on Sergeant Cecil in the Doncaster Cup, a target for the best stayers in the business over two and a quarter miles at 3.15pm.

St Leger Day on Saturday is an afternoon to savour, with the first of seven races due off at 2.05pm. It's the highly competitive Portland Heritage Handicap over the extended five furlongs and sprint king Dandy Nicholls reckons the best of his multiple entries is Indian Trail, due to be ridden by Richard Hughes.

However, the draw and pace is likely to have a marked effect on the outcome, though if Ken-more, another Dandy Nicholls entry, makes the cut I'd be more than interested following an eye-catching run last time out.

The Champagne Stakes at 2.35pm is a Group 2 seven furlongs contest for two-year-old colts and geldings, and Gerald Huffer's Cockney Rebel, earmarked for this after running second in the St Yearling Leger Stakes last month, should not be far away.

The Group 2 seven furlongs stakes race at 2.35pm sees an entry for this season's 1,000 Guineas winner Speciosa, to be ridden by Micky Fenton, though last year's victor Iffraaj (Frankie Dettori) looks primed for back-to-back victories if the going does not come up too soft. The Godolphin camp has also put in Echo Of Light, though note an alternative entry in the Group 3 1m 1f contest at 4.25pm.

The day's undoubted highlight at 3.45pm is the Group 1 St Leger for top-class three-year-olds - the oldest Classic race in the world, now offering record prize money of £475,000. Jeremy Noseda's Sixties Icon, to be ridden by Frankie Dettori, is the ante-post favourite for this year's renewal, trading at a shade odds-on midweek.

The Ribblesdale Stakes winner, Mont Etoile - part-owned by multiple St Leger-winning jockey Lester Piggott and trained by his son-in-law William Haggas - is also in the line-up and will be ridden by Michael Hills, trading at a best-priced 33/1 midweek.

Last year's winning trainer Aiden O'Brien is again keeping us guessing by entering four - Fire And Rain, Mountain, Puerto Rica and Tusculum. While running and riding plans will obviously give us a better indication, I think the favourite will take all the beating, though a much better value wager could be each way interest in Mont Etoile.