Dettori reveals next season may be his last

Frankie Dettori, by many lengths the racing personality best known to the general public, has said 2023 could be his last season in the saddle.

“I’m definitely riding on next year, I know that, 100%,” Dettori told the Sun newspaper, for which he appears in a regular Saturday column. “There are still some things to look forward to but next season might be my last. At the moment I’m still loving it, I’m riding whenever I can. But we’ll have to see how I’m feeling this time next year.

“Hopefully someone can find me a winner in the July Cup! That’s the only big race I need. “My shoulder is horrible, it looks black and it’s bruised. I got a right kicking [at Newmarket last week] but I can’t feel any pain.”

This year has certainly had its ups and downs for Dettori. It started with Dubai World Cup success on Country Grammer but he had a highly-publicised fallout at Royal Ascot with his main employer John Gosden. Following a brief “sabbatical”, they were reunited and went on to win the Prix Jacques le Marois with Inspiral and the Ebor with Trawlerman. Last weekend was also eventful for the 51-year-old, with a heavy fall at Newmarket quickly forgotten after winning the Dewhurst on Chaldean.

Dettori, who has always been synonymous with Ascot following his seven-timer at the track in 1996, has a high-profile ride today on Inspiral for Gosden in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes.

Preamble

Good morning from Ascot racecourse for the 12th Champions Day card, the most valuable afternoon in British racing and a meeting that will also – barring a U-turn of almost Truss-like proportions – see the outstanding colt Baaeed make his final appearance on the track, in the Champion Stakes at 4pm (all times BST).

This celebration of what is essentially a summer sport has suffered several times in recent years as a result of distinctly un-summery weather, and was even forced to move to the hurdles track three years ago to ensure the card’s survival. Just two of the 11 Champions Day cards to date have been run on the good-to-firm going that most tracks aim to provide on the Flat, while the other nine have all been staged on soft or good-to-soft ground.

The run-up to Baaeed’s swansong, though, has been blessed with better weather than is often the case in mid-October, but the track is still riding good-to-soft, and soft in places, and as Ascot’s highly informative going map shows, the “places” include a little more than half of the 10-furlong trip in the feature event.

Two of the unbeaten Baaeed’s 10 career wins have come on good-to-soft ground, including a narrow but convincing defeat of Palace Pier in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on this card last year, but today’s going is likely to be softer than anything he has experienced to date. In Adayar, last year’s Derby and King George winner, he is also up against the most accomplished rival he has faced to date.

It’s hard to get a line on precisely where Adayar is now, however, as his four-year-old season has been restricted to a single start at Doncaster last month, and the mood music in the betting market is not encouraging as he has eased from 5-1 to 6-1 overnight.

Baaeed, on the other hand, is now a 2-9 chance, while William Haggas, his trainer, starts the day as 8-11 favourite to win the trainers’ championship for the first time in his career. As Haggas conceded earlier this week, if Baaeed does not win the Champion Stakes, he will be “33-1, or 133-1” to land the title, regardless of whether Adayar – trained by his only serious rival, Charlie Appleby – takes the spoils.

Appleby, who is even-money for the title, could extend his current £77,000 lead significantly in the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes, the race before the Champion Stakes, where his three-year-old colt Modern Games is 4-1 second-favourite behind Inspiral, last year’s best juvenile filly.

Appleby also has runners with chances in the Group One Sprint, including the current joint-favourite, Creative Force, and another big hope in the Fillies & Mares race where Eternal Pearl is nudging up against Emily Upjohn, the Oaks runner-up, at the head of the betting.

Elsewhere on a top-class card, meanwhile, Hollie Doyle will be looking for a third successive win on Trueshan in the Long Distance Cup when the action gets under way at 1.25pm. Picks for the six-race card, all of which is televised on ITV1, are here, and you can follow all the action as the day unfolds here on the blog.