Gate 14 demands giant performance

Scratch Forbidden Apple and North East Bound from your calculations in the Mile, along with Honest Lady and Delaware Township in the Sprint. In 2000, leading fancies for both events emerged from the draw largely unscathed and, unlike Sir Michael Stoute's Susu in last year's Mile, no transatlantic challenger was clean bowled at this early stage.

In fact, with Indian Lodge, Distant Music, Dansili and Arkadian Hero all handed decent mid-field berths in the Mile, while Noverre and Turnberry Isle bagged gates five and seven in the Juvenile, we Euros were in the process of revelling in our large slice of luck.

But the Classic was last to be drawn and, as the other horses filled up the lower berths, there was a growing inevitability about Giant's Causeway's likely lot.

In ducking the occasion entirely, gentle O'Brien boxed clever. Having received the bad news in public, he may have had more qualms about exiting without a word like Stoute, who doubtless laid ten feet of rubber from his screaming car tyres, such was his anxiety to cut loose from this eclectic affair.

But Pat Day and Mike Smith - two top-flight US jockeys particularly qualified to judge such matters - and feted US form scientist Andy Beyer can offer O'Brien encouragement that the Giant's cause is far from lost, even while all around him push out his price.

"I was talking about this horse's draw with Frankie Dettori," responded Louisville-born Day, who at 46 still knows no equal around Churchill Downs as the winning-most rider there and most successful to date in the Breeders' Cup Series.

"The horse's running style is forwardly placed. Breaking from the 14 post, you have a long run down to the first turn - better than quarter of a mile - and with tactical speed he should be able to clear a bulk of the field and secure a decent position. It shouldn't be a major drawback."

"Gate 14 in the Classic is OK," agreed Smith. "By the turn, they'll be strung out and everybody can get where they want."

Smith, now 35, partnered Lure to that draw-defying successful defence of his 1992 Mile title and ascribes the Houdini act to his mount's exceptional ability and instant, malleable speed.

"Lure was very quick whenever you needed him to be and I did that day," he said. "Fortunately, he got away from the gate really fast and, when I saw I'd get hung nine horses wide on the bend, I just asked him for a little more and he really accelerated. I was able to clear them and get over to the rail just before they kissed us goodbye.

"You must do either that or decide straight away to tuck in behind - it depends on your horse. But if you go to do what Lure did and don't quite manage it, you've just about blown your race then and there."

Day echoes: "When the dust settles, you can look back and say if I would have gone then or if I'd have waited. But if is a great big word, even though it's only two letters."

He allows intimate knowledge of Churchill Downs as poor reason for his record, pointing to the identikit nature of all US tracks - flat, tight, left-handed and oval - and the good record of European jockeys riding here cold.

"The secret to riding Churchill Downs, as is the secret anywhere, is being on the best horse - the stock," he said. "When you're on the stock, you can take advantage of opportunities, jump into a hole when it opens and hold your position. When you're not on the stock, you can't get the job done."

Which brings us to Beyer, his nation's most respected speed student.

"They run the Kentucky Derby here with fields of 20 horses and horses from the 17 and 18 have won," proclaimed Beyer. "The draw won't be the main problem for Giant's Causeway - he's got much more to overcome than that. You never know whether a horse will translate its form from turf to dirt and vice versa. More often than not, the Europeans guess that wrong. But this colt has a pure US dirt pedigree. If he runs at the same level as on grass, he's got to be a tremendously strong contender whatever his gate."