Well-bred Yquem puts it all together The 39-rated Yquem looks set for a good rise in the weights after easily beating her 13 rivals in division two of the 1878 At 3Arena Handicap at Leopardstown. She landed a gamble in the process as from 25/1 in the morning she contracted to an opening show of 12/1 at the track and tumbled all the way down to 9/2 on the off. Recent Gowran Park winner Queen Aethelflaed led into the straight with Chris Hayes exerting his arms on Yquem who ran sixth at that stage. Yquem really found her stride a furlong and a half down, though, and stormed into the lead racing to the final furlong. The race was over in the final 150 yards as she poured the pressure on and drew clear to win by three and a half lengths. Nibras Rainbow, the 10/3 favourite, kept on without threatening in second and was three-quarters of a length in front of Medieval Night (12/1). Dick Brabazon said: "We only have three in training (Gilts won at Gowran on Friday), so we have a bit of pressure on our runner at the Curragh now - we run Tide Of Fortune there. "With the few we have, just looking at them riding out, they are just in form. You get to the middle of summer and horses are just well in themselves and they are out the field for a couple of hours. They are just in a good place. "She was very well-handicapped, obviously, if she was ever going to put it right. We had a top jockey. That was a difficult job to do from that draw (17). So, just everything went right. She is a Wootton Bassett out of a Galileo mare, so it was very important to get a win. She is in foal to Phoenix Of Spain so that's even more exciting. "Chris thinks that there is another race in her, so we'll keep going for another couple of months anyway and we'll be told when to stop." Additional reporting by John O'Riordan
