The English page - Busy weekend ahead

The 2023 season is now getting into top gear. Last Sunday we had the Carl Jaspers-Preis at Cologne, often known as the Gerling-Preis, the best race of the season so far. We usually get the top middle distance performances of the previous year lining up here and Sunday was no exception. The two best German 4yo´s were in the field of seven, including Assistent (Sea the Moon) and Tünnes (Guiliani), both trained locally by Henk Grewe and Peter Schiergen respectively, and they duly took the first two places. Assistent, a member of the celebrated Anna Paola family had finished fourth in last year´s German Derby, while Tünnes is a half-brother to 2021 Arc winner, also three times Horse of the year here Torquator Tasso; he had ended the local season with a convincing victory in the Group One Grosser Preis von Bayern at Munich; as a result he had a two kilo penalty here, which certainly did not make his task any easier. Despite that Tünnes still started favourite and looked like winning early in the straight. Assistent soon asserted however and went to score by 3 ½ lengths. There was.a problem however as Assistent started hanging in the straight, which probably made little difference to the result, but cost his jockey a day´s suspension. However Assistent was a worthy winner and both should be worth following this season.

This weekend should be even more exciting, as we have racing on four successive days, from Friday to Monday, most unusual for Germany, and they include two of the most important early season classic trials: the Dr. Busch-Memorial over the extended mile at Krefeld today and on Monday (May Day) the Bavarian Classic over 2000 metres at Munich. The distances make clear that the runners at Krefeld are aiming at the Mehl-Mülhens-Rennen (2,000 Guineas, Cologne, May 29th) while the Munich event is a prep for the German Derby itself, (Hamburg, July 2nd)

Both races have most of the usual suspects entered .This writer, if only for patriotic reasons. will be very interested to see show how the English-trained Brave Emperor (Sioux Nation) gets on at Krefeld. He has the best rating the race, having already won six races, including in decent listed level and probably has a fitness advantage as well. He will be ridden by Luke Morris, who has already partnered him to five victories. He has mainly been running on all-weather tracks, mainly both in France and England, and the expected rain is another positive: He could well start favourite, although Saint-Cloud (Amaron) whose trainer Henk Grewe continues in top form, looks a big danger.

The Bavarian Classic, previously known as the Grosser Hertie-Preis, also has a very strong field. Sammarco (Camelot) who was runner-up here last year went on to win the German Derby and also the Grosser Dallmayr-Preis over this CD. We well remember such stars as Acatenango and Athenagoras bringing off the double. 2020 it was Manfred Ostermann´s home bred Lavello who defeated Sammarco here; now his Skylo (Postponed); who won very nicely at Easter, could win again for him. At any event it would come as no surprise to see Brave Emperor and Skylo win this weekend and follow up in much better races later in the season. 

David Conolly-Smith