Stone Age (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) will sidestep Saturday's G1 Coral-Eclipse S. at Sandown in favour of a trip to America the following weekend.
The Aidan O'Brien-trained colt is now being aimed at the GI Belmont Derby, where he is likely to clash with Charlie Appleby's GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Turf and GI French 2000 Guineas winner Modern Games (Ire) (Dubawi {Ire}), who is set to be ridden by Frankie Dettori.
O'Brien won last year's Belmont race with Bolshoi Ballet (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) confirmed that plans were in place for a follow-up bid.
He said, “Stone Age will go to Belmont the following weekend instead.
“It will give him another week and obviously it's against 3-year-olds only. We can step up again after that, depending on how that goes.”
O'Brien, who won his sixth Eclipse with St Mark's Basilica (Fr) (Siyouni {Fr}) 12 months ago, will not be represented in this year's renewal.
He also left G1 Coronation Cup third High Definition (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) and Group 3 winner Aikhal (Ire) (Galileo {Ire}) in the Eclipse at Monday's confirmation stage, but the pair too have alternative targets.
“High Definition is going to go to the G1 Grand Prix de Saint-Cloud the following day and Aikhal is going to go to the G1 Grand Prix de Paris the following week [July 14],” the trainer added.
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