Zeus Olympios will bid for top-level success in QEII Zeus Olympios is all systems go for the Queen Elizabeth II Stakes on Qatar Racing British Champions Day, where Karl Burke’s crack miler will attempt to land an elusive top-level success. Highly progressive when unbeaten last term, victories have come tougher to find when mixing it with the best of his division this term, although after getting off the mark for the year in Ascot’s Summer Mile, he came within a neck of a first Group One triumph in the Prix Jacques le Marois last month. Freshened up since, he will now return to the scene of his earlier success for a race he is currently as short as 7-1 with some bookmakers. Burke said: “Zeus is in great form and I’m really happy with him. “We’re aiming at Champions Day and he was in the Group Two in France (Prix Daniel Wildenstein) at the weekend but we’re not going to do that and he’ll go straight to the QEII.” Yet to finish outside the top four in his five outings this term, Burke believes victory at Ascot would be nothing more than the son of Night Of Thunder deserves following his agonising near-miss at the hands of Rayif in Deauville. “He’ll do a couple of nice pieces of work over the next 10 days or so and he deserves one,” continued Burke. “Clifford (Lee) never drops his stick and had to drop it in the Group One last time – he couldn’t have done it at Wolverhampton in the evening could he! “I think he would have won that Group One in France on another day and he’s a horse you have to get rolling. Hopefully he can get his win at Ascot.”
