Next stop Baden-Baden for Fantastic Moon

Molly Hunter
August 30, 2023 1:38 pm

This weekend’s Group One has been a stepping stone to Arc glory.

Germany Derby hero Fantastic Moon will contest the Grosser Preis von Baden on Sunday – the race that paved the way to the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe for Germany’s most recent success story.

The Sarah Steinberg-trained three-year-old has a true German pedigree as he is by Sea The Moon and out of a German-bred mare named Frangipani.

He won the Preis des Winterfavoriten, a Cologne Group Three, as a two-year-old and demonstrated he had trained on into his three-year-old season with a third-placed run in the Bavarian Classic in May.

From there he headed to Baden-Baden and won the Derby trial by a comfortable three lengths, a performance that led him to emulate his sire and land the German Derby itself with a two-and-a-quarter-length success in early July

High-profile international targets were then discussed and the Arc was mentioned at one stage, but Fantastic Moon will take up neither his entry in the Prix Niel or the Irish Champion Stakes and will instead stay closer to home this weekend – in a Group One that was previously won by subsequent Arc hero Torquator Tasso.

Lars-Wilhlem Baumgarten of owners Liberty Racing said: “He is very well, he worked well on Monday in the morning and he will run in the Grosser Preis von Baden on Sunday.

“We nominated him today for the race, we supplemented him.

“We decided against the Champion Stakes and against the Prix Niel and went for Baden-Baden.

“It is a German race, we know the horses, there is one French horse in the race and then we will see how good he is.”

The colt would need to be supplemented if he were to follow the path trodden by Torquator Tasso and connections will reconsider that idea after Sunday’s performance.

Baumgarten said: “We will talk about that after the race on Sunday.”