Horse Racing: Trainer Cannot Envisage Eclipse of Authorized

"Everything worries you," Peter Chapple- Hyam said after watching Authorized, the Derby winner, work on the gallops at Newmarket yesterday morning, but apart from regular drags on a Marlboro Light, he seemed more like a man who hadn't got a care in the world.

It is four seasons since a Derby winner so much as won another race, and Authorized will be dropping back from 12 furlongs to 10 when he runs in the Coral- Eclipse Stakes on Saturday. He will still go to Sandown, though, with fierce stable confidence behind him.

Authorized galloped 3½ furlongs yesterday alongside the speedster Al Qasi, who contested the Group One sixfurlong Golden Jubilee Stakes at the Royal meeting. He moved with the same fluency that carried him down the hill and then five lengths clear of the field in the Derby, with no sign of any hangover from his eff orts on the Surrey downs.

"To win the Derby you've got to be wound up 120 %, because there's no second chance," Chapple-Hyam said. "A lot of Derby winners go to the Irish Derby or the Eclipse and they're over the top, and horses often do their best work when they're over the top, but luckily this horse is working exactly the same as he did before the Derby.

"He's grown up and matured a lot since Epsom, and I think he's improved too. I know that I've got him in as good form now as I've ever had him in, the same as he was for the Derby and I think maybe even better."

It was a brave decision to take on older horses over a mile and a quarter on Saturday rather than a field of threeyear- olds in the Irish Derby three days ago. Having seen Sunday's Classic at The Curragh, though, Chapple-Hyam is glad that he stayed at home.

"I want to give him the chance to be a very popular sire, and I thought the Eclipse was more likely to make that happen," Chapple-Hyam says. "I believe he's just as good at a mile and a quarter as he is at a mile and a half, and maybe slightly better, as he's got a lot of speed.

"It's a different ball game taking on the older horses. These are hardened professionals but you have to take them on some time. People say you should wait until the King George [at the end of this month] but there are plenty of horses that have done it in the Eclipse. The Irish Derby would probably have been the easier option but, looking at that ground on Sunday, we made the right decision. "

Chapple-Hyam expects to meet Curragh winner Soldier Of Fortune in the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe in Paris in the autumn, which could conceivably be the last race of a brief but hugely rewarding career. After Saturday, he hopes to run Authorized in the King George and then give him a break before a likely prep race for the Arc.

A great deal can happen in three months, though. Motivator, for instance, won the Derby in similar style to Authorized two years ago, having had an identical preparation for the Classic . In his next race after Epsom, though, he was beaten in the Eclipse and did not win another race.

"They ran in the same races and they have the same sire too," Chapple- Hyam says, "so it's something you think about. But Motivator's action was totally different to my horse, he always looked to be struggling a bit whereas mine has a much more fluid action."

Chapple-Hyam agrees with the bookmakers that George Washington will be Authorized's main rival on Saturday. Chapple-Hyam but could not resist a dig at the colt's well-publicized failure as a stallion earlier this season, which prompted his unintended return to the track this campaign.

"He used to be Gorgeous George," he said, "but now he's George the Jaffa. But it's great for racing that he's comeback, even if it's not great for his owners because they wanted him to be at stud. Competition is what racing is all about. If he beats us on Saturday, I'll hold my hands up."