Focus On the Flat: Super Sussex Stakes has brought out racing's F-word

Races Now’s Adam Smith looks back on a breathtaking Sussex Stakes which has prompted comparisons with one of the sport’s all-time greats…

Bow Echo brilliance lights up Goodwood

It had everything we wanted.

The Guineas winner. The 1,000 Guineas winner. The defending champion. This year’s Queen Anne winner. Last year’s Queen Anne winner. A horse that won a Group 2 just 24 hour earlier. A proper older horse. A field of 12. A healthy sprinkling of team tactics. A fantastic finish.

And boy, did those ingredients come together to create a masterpiece. Bow Echo extending his unbeaten record with a last gasp win in a spectacular Sussex Stakes.

I predicted (and hoped) this would be Bow Echo’s chance to stamp his authority on the mile division, and to show just how good he is after the inconveniences of Ascot, to put it very mildly.

There’s no doubt the racing public are falling in love with this horse. Much of that is down to Billy Loughnane and George Boughey, but being a top class operator certainly helps with that reputation too.

Do we have something special on our hands?

Now for the reaction…

The F word doesn’t get used as a comparison all the much in racing. But in the hours following Wednesday’s Sussex Stakes, the F word started popping up on X.

We all know the F word was head and shoulders above anything that we’ve seen before. But he was unbeaten. He won at Newmarket, Ascot and Goodwood. He became a public horse. Bow Echo has some way to go still.

For me, what really marked it as a fantastic race and a great performance is that Bow Echo looked beat half a furlong out. Fair and square. And if he’d have finished second to Opera Ballo, we wouldn’t have moaned. Even as a 10/11 favourite.

But Bow and Billy didn’t read that script, the afterburners were switched on and the rest is history.

What’s more, I thought he was quite comfortable at the line and there is still even more to come.

Next stop Deauville, you say? Frankel didn’t do that….

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