Haggas sets out Nassau aim for York victor Lilac Road

Nick Robson
May 18, 2022 11:38 am

Goodwood goal for Group Two winner.

Lilac Road has the Nassau Stakes at Goodwood as an aim later in the season having gained a first Group race win in the Middleton at York last week.

The William Haggas-trained four-year-old turned around previous form with Sir Michael Stoute’s Ville De Grace and relished the step up to an extended 10 furlongs.

While Haggas is keen to try her over a mile and a half at some point, with both the Lancashire and Yorkshire Oaks possible targets, it is the Nassau that is firmly on the agenda in July.

“It was a real pleasure. It’s always a risk running them back quickly and on the face of it it didn’t look like she could beat Ville De Grace as she had beaten her twice,” said Haggas.

Lilac Road toughing it out to win the G.2 Middleton Stakes at York for the Aisbitt’s 🏆🥇#TM pic.twitter.com/TzV0yMkqJS
— Tom Marquand (@TomMarquand) May 12, 2022

“But she improved to win, she got a lovely ride, a good split and did it really well – she loved the trip.

“Tom (Marquand) did say after Newmarket that he thought she would get a mile and a half well this year, so she could go out in trip.

“We kept her in training to win a Group race and she’s won a Group Two, so we’ve nothing to lose now so we’ll give it a roll.

“The Yorkshire Oaks is a possibility, we’ll try the Lancashire one first I would suspect, so I would think we’ll go there and miss Ascot.

“I want to have a shot at the Nassau. It may be too much but the Aisbitts (owners Jon and Julia) are from that part of the world and it’s Mrs Aisbitt’s birthday on that day, so we’ll go for that with a couple of races between now and then.”