This weekend marks four years since Galileo Gold (Ire) handed trainer Hugo Palmer a first British Classic win in the G1 Qipco 2000 Guineas, and while it will be some weeks yet before we see another name added to that historic contest's honour roll, with the race postponed to likely early June due to COVID-19, trainer Hugo Palmer is passing the time with memories of Al Shaqab's chestnut.
Palmer recalled on Wednesday how Galileo Gold, winner of the G2 Vintage S. at two and third in the G1 Prix Jean-Luc Lagardere, had initially been aimed at the G1 Poule d'Essai des Poulains before a stellar work over the Rowley Mile under Frankie Dettori prompted a change of course.
“All winter the French Guineas had been the plan, and he had the English entry because why not,” the Newmarket trainer said. “I remember he worked at the Craven meeting–Newmarket's rules are you can gallop on the racecourse if you have a Group 1 entry and I remember feeling almost fraudulent because we've got a Group 1 entry, but we're going to run in France, not here.
“I asked Frankie afterwards if he thought he'd be competitive in the French Guineas and he said, 'why do you want to go to France? This will win any Guineas'. He worked really, really well–he really opened up and gave Frankie a hell of a buzz.”
Galileo Gold justified Dettori's premonition and gave the rider a third win in the race.
“I remember the horse disappearing from view briefly from where I was standing and when he came back into view you could see Frankie's bottom motionless and everyone else was just beginning to niggle,” Palmer said. “That was probably at about the three [furlong pole] and I remember thinking then, 'we might win this.' I watched almost in stunned disbelief–from that moment on there was never a moment when you thought he wasn't going to win. It was smooth sailing straight to the line.
“I hoped and believed and dreamed it might happen, but those things you shut your eyes and dream of, you never really believe they will happen until they actually do. It was just a hugely exciting day and he took us on an exciting season.”
Palmer said swerving the G1 Investec Derby thereafter took “quite a lot of restraint,” but it was deemed the right decision after genetic tests suggested the blue riband's mile and a half trip was likely outside his scope.
“We did talk about it, my overriding lifetime ambition is to win the Derby and so it took quite a lot of restraint–when he crossed the line [in the Guineas] he was immediately Derby favourite. I just couldn't believe a horse that had been too keen over six furlongs first time out and had got beaten as a result could ever stay a mile and a half. I had terrible visions of what happened to Dawn Approach happening.
“We did actually do a genetic test to see if there was anything that suggested he could stay that distance, and the test came back that, at least on their findings, there was no way a mile and a half was going to be within his compass, so that just kind of knocked it on the head really. If it had come back and there was a degree of uncertainty in the test, I think we'd have had to give it a swing. But he's my only Royal Ascot winner to date and if we'd gone to the Derby and been beaten, it's unlikely he'd have won the St James's Palace, although Dawn Approach did of course.”
That St. James's Palace score was bookended by seconds in the G1 Irish 2000 Guineas and the G1 Sussex S., which was followed by an uncharacteristic off-the-board finish in the G1 Prix Jacques le Marois, with Palmer citing that the horse got wound up at Deauville and was never quite the same thereafter. He came back for one start at four, a fifth in the G1 Lockinge S., but was subsequently retired with a soft-tissue injury. Galileo Gold has his first yearlings this year.
“He came back from the Lockinge with a low-grade soft tissue injury, that if he were a gelding he would probably have been able to very happily run in the following year's Lockinge or similar–we could have tried other things with him,” Palmer said. “He was very fast and I wouldn't have ruled out a [G1] July Cup with him or maybe a [G1] Prix de la Foret. But unfortunately he picked up that injury and as a Classic winner and a colt, the obvious thing was to retire him.
“It won't be long and we'll be looking at his yearlings at the sales this autumn, if they happen. He was a very good horse and is bred to be a stallion. He was very fast, a dual Group 1 winner and he'd have to have a chance.”
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