Al Hudaiba denies Abraham Lincoln with Superlative performance

Al Hudaiba edged Abraham Lincoln in a thrilling finish to the battle of racing’s superpowers in Newmarket’s Boodles Superlative Stakes.

Aidan O’Brien’s Abraham Lincoln was the 8-13 favourite to follow up his impressive Curragh victory on debut and add his name to a roll of honour that includes distinguished Ballydoyle luminary City Of Troy.

It appeared the son of Wootton Bassett was about to create another taking impression when Ryan Moore kicked for home with a furlong to run.

However, William Buick was conjuring an exceptional finishing display from Charlie Appleby’s dual winner, whose race experience saw him answer every call from his jockey and hunt down Abraham Lincoln in the final stride to shade a short-head verdict at 5-2.

Al Hudaiba would be unbeaten in four starts had he not thrown away certain victory when unshipping Tom Marquand at Yarmouth, and Appleby said: “He’s a horse with a lot of talent and in the first half of the race we were happy with where we were, but Will said he started to shift underneath him and it’s a job to stay on, let alone trying to get him to gallop out – he said staying on is the hardest part.

“I wasn’t confident when they get as close as that, especially with the luck I’ve had over recent weeks, but I was sort of confident when he got his head down and started to gallop because he has got a lot of ability this horse, we’ve seen that at home.

“Full credit to the lads at home just for staying on him. Billy (Loughnane) has ridden him a few times for us and he puts some shapes in!

“I hope he’ll grow out of it, whether we need to put something around his head (headgear) to make him concentrate a bit harder, I don’t know. He’s one of those horses that finds life very easy because he has that engine there, but if he’s going to go up into the bigger leagues he’s going to have to concentrate a bit harder.”

Appleby, who was winning the Superlative for the third year in a row and seventh time in total, added: “I think we’ll look at the National Stakes in Ireland. I think the ground will potentially suit him there as one thing Will did say today was that he was feeling the ground.

“We’ll see over the coming weeks as the two-year-olds come out what other people have got and more importantly what else we might try to unearth at home.”

Of the runner-up, O’Brien said: “He ran a lovely race, he was just very green when he got there (the front) wasn’t he?

“He did it the first day as well – he got there and pulled up. We’ll just have to get there later!”