BETFRED MIDDLETON STAKES ON THE AGENDA

TWO-TIME Group 1 winner Covert Love could start off her 2016 campaign in the Group 2 Betfred Middleton Stakes at York – ahead of taking on the colts.

Trainer Hugo Palmer has outlined an exciting plan for the Darley Irish Oaks heroine that includes Thursday May 12’s mile-and-a-quarter race on the Knavesmire.

Covert Love was one of the stars of last season, also winning over course and distance in late May, then the Group Prix de l’Opera and finishing a neck second to Pleascach in the Darley Yorkshire Oaks at York. Her only two reverses from seven races in 2015 came when there was some ease in the ground.

The likelihood is the four-year-old Azamour filly will be kept to quicker surfaces this term with top targets such as the Prince of Wales’s Stakes, Eclipse Stakes and King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes under consideration.

The Breeders’ Cup in November could also on be the agenda for Palmer’s stable star, who is one of twenty-six entries for the £120,000 Betfred Middleton Stakes.
Newmarket-based Palmer said: “Covert Love is in great form. She looks fantastic – she’s much bigger and stronger than she was last year.

“She’s got an entry in the Middleton. She runs well at York. Granted a decent racing surface, I would have thought we’d be turning up at the Middleton – she won’t run before.

“I’d like, at some point, to have a go at the colts. If we don’t run in the Middleton that means we’d be taking on the colts first time…we might have to go to the Prince of Wales’s first time, the Eclipse or even the King George.”

Palmer added: “I’d like her to go to Santa Anita for the Breeders’ Cup. She is a Group 1 winner over 10 and 12 furlongs – the world’s her oyster.”

Palmer is also aware of the quality of this season’s older fillies and mares’ division, which includes Arabian Queen – winner of the 2015 Juddmonte International Stakes at York last August.

She has a Betfred Middleton Stakes entry as does Euro Charline who ran brilliantly to finish second in the $6million Group 1 Dubai Turf at Meydan on Saturday. Trainer Marco Botti’s five-year-old charge also has options in Hong Kong and a Lockinge Stakes entry.

Botti said: “I need to discuss with Team Valor (owners of Euro Charline) which route we will go. Ideally, I would like to stick with a mile but a mile and a quarter on a flat track like York might be an option. She came back from Dubai on Monday. She battled on and it was a great run.”

York’s season-opening Dante Festival runs from Wednesday, May 11 to Friday, May 13 inclusively.