Lope De Vega Filly Takes Meydan's Balanchine

Very Special may have had everything go her way when winning the Feb. 4 G2 Cape Verdi S. at Meydan on the front end, but the Godolphin colourbearer proved that score was not a fluke with another gate-to-wire winning performance in Thursday's G2 Balanchine S. Very Special, a half-sister to the 2013 G1 Dubai Fillies Mile and GI Breeders' Cup Juvenile Fillies Turf winner Chriselliam (Ire) (Iffraaj {GB}), has yet to finish off the board in seven outings. She broke her maiden in her first of two juvenile outings and recorded a season-opening score at Kempton last April. She started just twice more last year, finishing second in a pair of listed races at Lingfield and Kempton both over a mile, and was a three-length winner over Excilly after setting a soft pace first-up in the Cape Verdi. Taking up the lead once again Thursday but not allowed to bowl along quite as easily, Very Special opened up a five-length lead around the turn under James Doyle while international favourite Euro Charline raced slightly worse than midpack after running a bit freely early. Doyle put Very Special to a drive as Euro Charline swung four wide in hot pursuit coming off the turn, but Godolphin's filly was not for catching despite hauling three pounds more than Euro Charline, holding the Grade I winner at bay by 2 1/2 lengths.

“It's always good to get away from the front end but you have to have the animal beneath you,” said Doyle. “The whole team have done a wonderful job with her. She's made really good progression from her first run to today and it was a good performance.”

“We spoke about it beforehand and we thought it was a pretty tough task, but I was just hoping even to go home [to Europe] that she'll be a nice horse,” Doyle added. “She's proved that today.”

Very Special could now be drawing comparison's with Godolphin's 2013 Cape Verdi/Balanchine winner Sajjhaa (GB) (King's Best), who went on to win the G1 Dubai Duty Free–now Dubai Turf–on World Cup night. Doyle admitted that Very Special would have to progress again to take that $6 million contest in three weeks' time.

“It's a tricky one,” he said. “It's a massively strong race and she'd have to improve again. She's a filly we have to take it step-by-step with so she'll tell us by how she comes out of it whether she'll take that step. It's possible.”

Very Special's dam has an as-yet unnamed 2-year-old colt by Henrythenavigator and a yearling filly by Galileo (Ire).

Thursday, Meydan, Dubai
BALANCHINE SPONSORED BY SKYWARDS-G2, $200,000, MEY, 3-3, NH4yo/up & SH3yo/up, f/m, 1800mT, 1:48.85, gd.
1–VERY SPECIAL (IRE), 129, f, 4, by Lope de Vega (Ire)
1st Dam: Danielli (Ire), by Danehill
2nd Dam: Ingabelle (Ire), by Taufan
3rd Dam: Bodelle (Ire), by Falcon (GB)
(280,000gns Ylg '13 TATOCT). O-Godolphin; B-Ballylinch Stud
(IRE); T-Saeed bin Suroor; J-James Doyle. $120,000. Lifetime
Record: 7-4-2-1, $339,522. *1/2 to Janicellaine (Ire) (Beat
Hollow {GB}), GSP-US, $124,223; Chriselliam (Ire) (Iffraaj {GB}),
Hwt. 2yo Filly-Eur, G1SW-Eng & US, $$729,684. Click for the
eNicks report & 5-cross pedigree. Werk Nick Rating: A+++
*Triple Plus*.
2–Euro Charline (GB), 126, m, 5, Myboycharlie (Ire)–Eurolink
Artemis (GB), by Common Grounds (GB). (800gns Ylg '12
TATFEB; 13,000gns Ylg '12 TATOCT). O-Team Valor
International; B-Brian Liversage (GB); T-Marco Botti. $40,000.[bullet ad=”irt-shell”]3–Excilly (GB), 126, f, 4, Excellent Art (GB)–Afra Tsitsi (Fr), by
Belong to Me. (€52,000 Ylg '13 ARAU2). O-Bellman Lowe
O'Halloran Trowbridge; B-Haras du Cadran, P Hoze & C Lerner
(GB); T-Tom Dascombe. $20,000.
Margins: 2HF, 4HF, 1 3/4.
Also Ran: Icecapada (Ire), More Aspen, Malka (Fr), Si Luna (Ger).
Click for the Racing Post result or the free Equineline.com catalogue-style pedigree. VIDEO.

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