The race I'm backing him for is the Arc, because 14-1 is too big.Ī spokesman for his owner, Khalid Abdullah, said this week that Byword was seen by André Fabre, the colt's trainer, as a mile-and-a-half horse at the end of last year. I'd favour Byword, but I'll probably keep my hands in my pockets this time. Twice Over is widely reckoned to have been a bit unlucky when failing to catch Byword at Royal Ascot and Tuesday's International should be a fascinating rematch. The money you take would be small potatoes, compared to what you see in the last 10 minutes before the race starts, even for races like the Cheltenham Gold Cup and the Derby." It's rare to get extremely rich or extremely poor on a long-range market but they help to get people interested. "Ante-post betting is not a revenue-driver so much as a shop window for the sport. "Do you grumble and squeal when that happens? No," Williams says. They laid 8-1 and 7-1 about Twice Over, now cut to 3-1 in Harbinger's absence, giving a warm and fuzzy feeling to those who backed him before Saturday's news. Williams said his firm had hardly laid a copper coin on the world's highest-rated racehorse for York, whereas they saw plenty of interest in other runners at bigger prices. If 7-4 was unattractive for the Arc, how much less so was the even money for next week's Juddmonte International, over a distance that Harbinger may have found on the short side. Punters know this and are not easily tempted by skinny odds for distant targets.
It might have seemed that Harbinger had only to turn up to win the Longchamp race but, as we have seen, it is dangerous to assume that a horse can stay healthy for two months.
Two weeks later, when Harbinger crocked himself, he was still available at those odds and, according to Williams, there had not been nearly enough support to justify a shorter price. Ladbrokes' David Williams told me yesterday that, as he watched the owners celebrate in the winners' enclosure, he priced the colt at 7-4 for the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe.
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