Options open for Piz Badile before Epsom

Simon Milham
May 1, 2022 11:19 am

Smart colt entered picture for premier Classic with Ballysax triumph.

Connections of Ballysax Stakes scorer Piz Badile are still weighing up options ahead of a tilt at the Cazoo Derby.

Owned by the Niarchos family, the Donnacha O’Brien-trained son of Ulysses has won two of this three starts and impressed on his seasonal debut, showing plenty of determination to land the 10-furlong Group Three event at Leopardstown earlier this month.

He is still on course for the mile-and-a-half Epsom Classic – for which he is a general 20-1 chance – with options prior to that fluid, according to the owners’ racing manager, Alan Cooper, although what was the Derrinstown Stud Derby Trial was mentioned immediately after his Ballysax win.

😲 Oh, brother!
Piz Badile, trained by Donnacha O’Brien, battles back to beat Buckaroo, trained by his older brother Joseph, in a thrilling P.W. McGrath Memorial Ballysax Stakes at @LeopardstownRC pic.twitter.com/4yYPrvTToa
— Racing TV (@RacingTV) April 2, 2022

He said: “Piz Badile is on course for the Derby and Donnacha is plotting out the best way to get there. I’m not even going to say yes or no to whether he will have a trial or not.

“He is very well and pleasing Donnacha, and he will plot the best way to get him to Epsom.

“I don’t want to speculate what race he will or won’t go for, but all is well and he is going to Epsom.”

Meanwhile, fast-improving four-year-old Tyrrhenian Sea has raced exclusively on the all-weather since making his debut in December and carried the family’s colours under the Flaxman Stables Ireland Ltd name when runner-up to Living Legend in the Easter Classic at Newcastle, having travelled like the winner for a long way.

Great race! Living Legend snatches the Betway Easter Classic from Tyrrhenian Sea at @NewcastleRaces for Joe Fanning and @Johnston_Racing! pic.twitter.com/vADDYsR1IR
— At The Races (@AtTheRaces) April 15, 2022

The Roger Varian-trained Dark Angel gelding won his first three outings at Newcastle over a mile before suffering two defeats over 10 furlongs and will now revert back in distance for his next run.

Cooper said: “We haven’t discussed plans with Roger yet where he will go.

“What we will do is drop him back to the mile. We thought it was the trip that caught him out the other day.

“We had a slight question mark but thought we should go for it, but when we next see him it will be over a mile.”

Sir Michael Stoute is in no rush with New Dimension (Mike Egerton/PA)

After a debut win at Leicester in September, New Dimension was odds-on to make a winning start to his three-year-old campaign at Nottingham on Tuesday, but failed to concede 7lb and was beaten a neck by Marsoul.

The Ulysses colt, trained by Sir Michael Stoute, will improve for the outing, according to Cooper.

He said: “The idea of going to that race was to bring him forward so we will need a few more days to mull over where we go next.

“We will see what Sir Michael will want to do in the next couple of weeks. There is no pressure on the horse and there are lots of options.

“We very much hope he is one for the future. He won nicely last year and the race didn’t go according to plan the other day.

“He was a bit pernickety at the start and he was a little green. It was a race that would have done him a lot of good. Mentally it would have helped him.”