Evening Saigon continues magical week for Wathnan with Stewards’ Cup win

James Doyle picked the right one from three choices as his bosses at Wathan Racing topped an amazing week with victory in the Coral Stewards’ Cup with Evening Saigon.

The win was a feather in the cap for the owners, who target this fixture with a vengeance, but perhaps more telling it was a second major handicap of the week for Qatari-born trainer Hamad Al Jehani.

Having also won the Golden Mile with Archivist when Doyle picked the wrong one, Al Jehani was able to celebrate a famous victory with the whole team on this occasion.

Despite higher numbers being preferred at Thursday’s draw, the finish was dominated by the eventual winner drawn in 10 beating Stratusnine in five. Jamie Spencer flew from the back on Mitbaahy for third but he was beaten a head and a short head. Completely Random was fourth.

“It’s been a great week. Obviously I was very deflated last year with just one  and we were really frustrated by that so the memo was we need to do better and that’s everyone, including me as well,” said Doyle.

“We’ve done a lot of work this week looking at different tactics and things like that, track position and stuff. All the guys back home in the office, these guys, Hamad has done an unbelievable job with this horse as well.

“He’s not an easy conveyance, setting off he was that well in himself he tried to get rid of me the first few strides but that was great.

“We just had the perfect set up. Dark Thirty was near me, I was able to draft in behind him and we didn’t go that mad I didn’t think for a Stewards’ Cup so I was happy to pull him out before the two and set sail for home.

“I knew the second horse, I won on him the other day at York, he’s a pretty decent horse too so it was a good tussle up to the line.

“Hamad and his team, it’s nice that they have won the two big handicaps this week.”

Al Jehani said: “I am very happy for Evening Saigon and very happy for the team. He performed very well at Royal Ascot and it was the right decision from the management to keep him for the Stewards’ Cup.

“It’s really important for us and it’s a really important race for the season. I’m very happy and thanks to James for giving the horse a great ride.

“It’s not easy to be competitive with the best trainers in the world but we try our best and I think we are building in a very good way, with great help from the management. Hopefully, we will improve year by year and we can make Wathnan be in the winner’s enclosure more and more.”

Wathnan’s racing adviser Richard Brown added: “James had a bit of a hard choice but he was pretty firm on riding this lad in the end. Hamad has turned up and won two of the hardest handicaps to win all year. We plot these and work as a team – when these results come off, it’s just fantastic for Wathnan and what Wathnan is all about.

“If you look at Hamad’s statistics since he started training, they match up with the best trainers in the country. He’s a phenomenal horseman and was a very good rider himself. He’s very modest about it but he showjumped to a good level. He’s a great horseman and he’s formed a great team. We all work very closely together and to pull this off is huge for everybody involved.”