Keane delighted to see Kalpana getting recognition she deserves Colin Keane feels Kalpana is finally getting the recognition she deserves ahead of the Legends Global Yorkshire Oaks. Keane has ridden Andrew Balding’s five-year-old in all bar one of her races since his appointment as retained rider to her owners Juddmonte in June last year. He missed last year’s King George VI And Queen Elizabeth Stakes through suspension when Oisin Murphy partnered her into second behind Calandagan, but with Keane back on for the same race this year, she turned the tables on the French superstar. Keane won another Group One on her on Champions Day in October and in 17 races she has only finished outside the front three once, on very soft ground in last year’s Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe. “She’s up there with the best in the world now and she’s starting to get the recognition she deserves. She’s a queen, so she is,” said Keane. “She was very good at Ascot and I’m looking forward to seeing her back out. “Ascot does seem to really suit her, for whatever reason I don’t really know. She’s such a straightforward mare, though, and York is a flat, left-handed track so there’s no reason she won’t be as effective there. “You can forgive her Arc run for the ground and that is just about the only day she has slightly underperformed.” Aidan O’Brien’s Minnie Hauk was second in last year’s Arc, but has so far failed to hit those heights this season and was beaten a long way in the King George. However, she did win this race 12 months ago, for what was the last of her Group One hat-trick last summer. “The plan was that she’ll go to the Yorkshire Oaks and then we’ll go back to the Arc with her,” O’Brien told Racing TV. “We rode her a little bit too forward in the King George. She got caught beside Lambourn all the way and she was probably in a gear too high the whole way and it just cost her in the last furlong. “She’s one of those fillies where a mile and a half is far enough for her – you wouldn’t want to go any further – and as we saw at Royal Ascot she’s very comfortable at a mile and a quarter.” Joseph O’Brien has a good handle on this year’s fillies having won the Oaks at Epsom with Thundering On and the Irish version with Johanna Walsh. It is the latter who is the chosen representative this week. O’Brien said: “Johanna Walsh has had a good preparation for the (Yorkshire) Oaks. We think she will like the track in York and will love the ground. It looks a very competitive race, but we are excited to take her there. “Thundering On has had a little mid-season break and Johanna obviously wasn’t as busy earlier in the season so it makes sense for her to go on to here from the Curragh.” Jim Bolger first won the Yorkshire Oaks in 1981 with Condessa and then had to wait until 2008 to win it again with Lush Lashes. Pleascach gave him a third success in 2015 and he chases a fourth with Sparan Nua. She did not lose her unbeaten record until the Irish Oaks when third and had a run back down at a mile last time out. “Things didn’t work out too well there in the Irish Oaks so she would be value for a bit more than that,” said Bolger. William Haggas’ Ribblesdale winner Earth Shot, Ralph Beckett’s improving Tattycoram and David Menuisier’s Inis Mor, second in the Irish Oaks, add further strength in depth.
