Ogden Eyeing Melbourne Cup Bid

Sir Robert Ogden, one of the few British owners with the firepower to take on the international big guns in the racing tips world, could be set to train his sights on an audacious bid to land one of the racing world’s most coveted prizes, the Melbourne Cup, at Flemington in November, with his improving colt Sans Frontiere, writes Elliot Slater.

Yorkshireman Ogden has been in the racing business for decades and has tasted plenty of success under both codes, but his highest profile wins thus far have been in the National Hunt sphere with household names such as champion chaser Voy Por Ustedes, the enigmatic and hugely talented Exotic Dancer, Ungaro, Star De Mohaison and the tremendously popular Marlborough.

Last week’s Newmarket July meeting though proved something of a watershed for Ogden, who not only saw Sand Frontiere spring a 14/1 shock in the Group2 Princess of Wales’s Stakes, but tasted further Group2 glory when his juvenile colt King Torus landed the Superlative Stakes.

Sans Frontiere, a distant fourth to the smart Harbinger in the Hardwicke Stakes at Royal Ascot last month, showed much improved form to run out a cosy winner from Redwood in the HQ feature, and winning trainer Jeremy Noseda has confirmed that after running the idea past Ogden there is a chance that the Galileo colt will be trained with a view to bidding for the ‘race that stops a nation’ some 12,000 miles away in Australia in late autumn.

Noseda also suggested that a bid for the Group1 Irish St Leger at the Curragh is another distinct possibility and that all plans remain fluid.

Some betting tips are offering a price about Sans Frontiere beating the Aussies in their own backyard, and currently go 33/1.