Last season's Cazoo St Leger winner Eldar Eldarov (GB) (Dubawi {Ire}) will try and add the Irish equivalent during this year's Irish Champions Festival.
“The target for him is to go to the Irish St Leger and that is very much still on the cards at the moment,” said Chris Wall, racing manager for owners KHK Racing Ltd. “He's grand and it's all systems go for that.”
The 4-year-old was originally slated to contest the G3 St Leger trial earlier this month, however, was subsequently declared a non-runner after not travelling well.
“We don't know why because he's never had that problem before,” he explained. “He got upset travelling and they thought rather than carry on to Ireland they would bring him home. I think they had got into north Wales just beyond Chester.
“The worry was if you put him on the ferry and it deteriorated into something like colic then you are in the middle of the sea and you can't do anything about it. He just got his knickers in a twist about something so they brought him home.”
Trained by Roger Varian, Eldar Eldarov was second in his seasonal debut in the G2 Yorkshire Cup S. in May before finishing seventh in the G1 Ascot Gold Cup the following month. Most recently, he was fourth in the G1 Goodwood Cup S. on Aug. 1.
Varian indicated that KHK Racing-owned Sakheer (Ire) (Zoffany {Ire}), the winner of last fall's G2 Mill Reef S., is likely to resurface later this fall in the QIPCO British Champions Sprint Oct. 21. He was last seen finishing 13th in the G1 Commonwealth Cup at Royal Ascot June 23.
“He's had a few niggly things after Ascot, but he's back in work and we're hoping to run him in something this autumn,” said Wall. “I don't think he'll be ready for the Haydock [Betfair Sprint Cup Sept. 9], that's not far away now so he won't make that. But we hope we might have him back for a run perhaps in the Champions Sprint and we'll go from there.
“It's been one of those years really where things haven't quite gone his way, but we hope we can get him back on track and if not we'll have to hope things go right for him next year instead.”
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