Almanzor's shock eclipse leaves key questions on Arc road

Even the lass leading Almanzor back down the chute from the track at Deauville on Tuesday looked as if she was struggling to come to terms with his stunning defeat in the Prix Gontaut-Biron.

On an afternoon that will live long in the memories of those who were there, last year's champion looked a shadow of his former self in dead-heating for last on his much-delayed return to action.

No amount of work had been enough to shake off the rust of ten months away from racing and the gamble to keep Almanzor going at all, after losing so much of the spring to illness and injury, looks to have gone astray at this point.

A long 45 minutes later, with the air hanging heavy over the racecourse, there was something strangely inevitable about his stablemate Brametot's subdued performance in the Prix Guillaume d'Ornano, and for trainer Jean-Claude Rouget time looks very short on the road to the Arc.

For the rest of the racing world, it could be the journey is only just getting started: an awful lot can happen in the next eight weeks.

August blues

Followers of US racing will be familiar with the phenomenon of this month being something of a silly season for results, with Saratoga having earned its reputation as a graveyard of champions over the years and Del Mar even getting the measure of Arrogate, such has been the downright strange nature of summer 2017 Stateside.

Rouget pointed out on Tuesday that you have to ease off on a horse over the summer if you still want to challenge for the autumn prizes, though he must have been dismayed that both Almanzor and Brametot were so soundly beaten.

At least one Arc-winning trainer of high reputation is extremely wary of Deauville’s round course and defeat here may not be quite the end of the road.

Enable in pole position

One of the glories of Khalid Abdullah's triple Group 1 winner is her apparent simplicity. She just goes out and gets it done, always appearing strongest in the final furlong.

In the version of the Arc where Brametot doesn't completely blow the start and brings his own serious turn of foot into play, Enable will encounter every ounce of resistance.

Yet as Rouget said in a disarmingly frank exchange on Tuesday afternoon, we are dealing with racehorses, not racing cars.

Quotes of around even money for the Arc are bordering on insulting, if not to Enable's potential opposition, then to the sheer unpredictability of training and racing top-class thoroughbreds.

Japanese hopes increase

It seems like we say it every autumn but my own belief has long been that when (and it is only a matter of when, not if) a Japanese-trained horse wins the Arc, it will be because two conditions have been met: the right horse has to run, and they have to avoid coming up against a standout European challenger in the Zarkava/Sea The Stars/Treve mould.

Connections of Satono Diamond have more to overcome in their challenge than any of their European-trained opposition but Yasutoshi Ikee and Christophe Lemaire will both have taken a close interest in events here on Tuesday. Condition two might just have come a little closer to fruition.

Satono Diamond (Christophe Lemaire) winning the Grade 2 Hanshin Daishoten in MarchCredit: Masakazu Takahashi

Time to Reel around Chantilly

Arguably the biggest imponderable in the Arc picture is whether last year’s runner-up, Highland Reel, will be given the opportunity to cap his glittering career with the biggest prize of all. As a three-year-old he skipped Longchamp in favour of a tilt in the Cox Plate and has once again been entered in Australia.

The question might be whether Coolmore are more concerned by Enable and her considerable allowances or Winx, who has thus far proved invincible at Moonee Valley. But that is to underestimate how much of a sporting challenge Aidan O’Brien and his employers enjoy and Highland Reel’s presence at Chantilly would considerably enhance the 2017 Arc.

Don't forget Eminent

For as much as Brametot disgraced himself leaving the stalls on Tuesday, it was wonderful to see Eminent put in a performance that his early-season promise had hinted at.

Martyn Meade has the option of waiting for the Champion Stakes but was by no means ruling out a shot at the Arc.

As a winner of the Craven Stakes, Eminent fits the profile of a couple of French-trained horses that landed Classic trials impressively but who then took a while to cash in on a Group 1 (the Guillaume d’Ornano is a Group 2 in name only) in Senga and, most recently, Al Wukair.