SINGSPIEL
Courtesy of Dubai Racing Club
1997 - SINGSPIEL
A year later, Sheikh Mohammed's colours were successful when home-bred Singspiel, trained in Britain by Sir Michael Stoute, added the world's biggest prize to his glittering portfolio of successes.
There was drama beforehand as an incredible deluge of rain meant the event could not take place as scheduled on Saturday, March 29, having to be postponed until the following Thursday, but it was a race worth waiting for.
American rider Jerry Bailey once more partnered the winner and Richard Mandella saddled the runner-up again, with Siphon finding Singspiel 1¼ lengths too good.
By the time Singspiel retired to stud at the end of 1997, he had compiled a CV that most racehorses could only dream about. Coming to Dubai, he had won the Japan Cup and Grade One Canadian International at Woodbine, as well as being narrowly beaten in the previous year's Breeders' Cup Turf. After his Nad Al Sheba victory, he was to add two British Group Ones, the Coronation Cup at Epsom and Juddmonte International at York, to cap a great career.
Bailey said: "When it comes to looking for the best horse in the world at the moment, Singspiel heads the list," while Frankie Dettori, who rode the horse to his later victories, described him as "the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world."
Nicholas Godfrey of the Racing Post wrote: "The race it seemed might never happen came to pass in the most dramatic fashion last night when Singspiel gained a thrilling victory in the second running of the Dubai World Cup.
"The $4 million event, richest in the world, produced the most suitable of heirs to the inestimable Cigar in Singspiel, a living testimony to the training skills of Michael Stoute."
Timeform's Racehorses of 1997 said: "The achievements of Singspiel and the rest of his outstanding older-horse contemporaries contributed greatly to the racing year. We are fortunate to have had them around."
David L Heckerman wrote in The Blood-Horse: "In the uncertain world of thoroughbred racing, it is hard to imagine any big idea being executed more efficiently and comprehensively than Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum's grand plan for the Dubai World Cup.
"Barely 24 months ago, Sheikh Mohammed first proposed conducting a championship-caliber horse race on the edge of the desert for the richest purse ever offered anywhere in the world. Twelve months ago, he hailed Cigar, victor in the inaugural $4-million Dubai World Cup, as the reigning Horse of the World.
"This year on April 3, Sheikh Mohammed watched and listened at Nad Al Sheba Racecourse as his grand plan produced further rewards. First, he saw his own world-travelling five-year-old Singspiel defeat a stout American challenge to win the second World Cup.
"He then heard Singspiel - turf champion in North America in 1996, winner of last November's Japan Cup, and now triumphant over three of the best dirt-track horses from America - applauded as a worthy successor to Cigar on the world stage."