DYLAN THOMAS NO LONGER JUST A HOMETOWN HERO

Foreign runners don't exactly have a great record in the Prix Ganay. Just three has won the race since WWII before this year and only one of the 20 foreign starters in the ten runnings prior to the latest one had succeeded.

DYLAN THOMAS (43) looked to have a tough task to reverse this trend as he had failed to win in five previous runs outside Ireland. But he did so in style, scoring impressively while earning the biggest speed rating I've awarded a horse all season.

This was a big, international class effort from Dylan Thomas. It marks him out as the best older horse Aiden O'Brien has so far trained and the one to beat in all the top races to come.

I think that the previous foreign losses of Dylan Thomas had more to do with a dislike of soft ground and inexperience than a dislike of traveling.

Dylan Thomas has run unplaced the only two times he's encountered a surface softer than good according to the going allowances I make for my speed ratings. But if two photo finishes had gone the other way he would have won all nine times he's run on good or firmer turf.

This looks set to be a vintage year for older horses with brilliant four year olds like Red Rocks, Rail Link, Lauro and Tam Lin all aiming for the big middle distance prizes. But on fast ground Dylan Thomas can run with any of them.

Before the race I had thought that IRISH WELLS (41) was a pretty good thing to score.

I rated Irish Wells one of the top three year olds in Europe last year. His win in the Grand Prix de Deauville actually earned him a bigger speed rating than I gave given Dylan Thomas all season.

The problem Irish Wells has is that he is not able to run up to his best in a slow run race, as we saw when he himself set a dawdling gallop in the Arc de Triomphe. That's why his trainer stuck a pacemaker in for him here.

The pacemaker did his job well and enabled Irish Wells to equal his best pervious speed rating to run second.

Irish Wells is probably a bit better over a mile and a half than the ten and a half furlongs of this race. So he's clearly a contender for all the big Group 1 races. The obvious concern is that in France, and to an increasing extent elsewhere, the mile and a half races he's likely to shoot for are often run at a slow early pace. Then again his trainer solved this problem by throwing in a pacemaker here and will probably do so again.

DOCTOR DINO (41) once more proved that he is a better horse over ten furlongs than over the seven and eight furlongs he was mostly restricted to till last Autumn. He's running very consistently over the trip, having won three of the five previous times he tried it and getting beat less than three lengths in the Prix du Jockey Club in one of his losses. I wouldn't discount his chances of taking a Group 1 sometime this term and he'll certainly be hard to beat below this level.

BORIS DE DEAUVILLE (41) is another horse that is clearly better over longer trips. He showed serious improvement to take the key prep race for the Ganay, the Prix d'Harcourt (which 20 of the previous 28 Ganay winners had run in). And he ran another big race here to finish a close fifth. He too looks like a player in Group 1 races and a good thing to win lesser events.

COQUERELLE IS A CHAMPION

A few years ago a three year old filly called Ouija Board ran a mind-bogglingly fast time to win a minor race in the Spring. In fact she earned the biggest speed rating I've ever given a three year old filly in the first half of the season. Ouija Board went on to win seven Group 1 races and become an international superstar.

Now COQUERELLE (41) has gone and run just as fast as Ouija Board did to win a minor race at Longchamp. In fact she equaled the fastest time run over 1950 metres at the course in the last decade (in the Group 2 Prix Dollar by the smart older male horse Touch Of Land).

Coquerelle was last with little more than a furlong to run but produced a sensational turn of foot to power past all her rivals. She has now won all three of her starts and was scoring here over a trip just 55 yards short of a mile and a quarter. So it looks like she has the Prix de Diane (French Oaks) at her mercy.

If you look at her pedigree it's hard to argue that Coquerelle will get the mile and a half she'll need to stay if she's going to be competitive in the Prix Vermeille and the Arc later this season. But these days, when horses are so much more speedily bred than they used to be, it's unwise to be too dogmatic about stamina limits imposed by a horse's pedigree. The fact is Coquerelle has the turn of foot that wins big middle distance races nowadays. In addition the photos I've seen of her make it clear that she is a good-bodied, deep-chested sort with a long stride (she actually looks more like a colt - a very mature one at that). In other words, she's built to go a mile and a half.

I fervently wish that some bookie was betting on the Arc de Triomphe. If they were I reckon they'd be offering 50-1 or more about Coquerelle and I'd be biting their arm off to take it.

Let me be clear here: I believe that Coquerelle is going to prove the best three year old of either sex in Europe this year. That's what my ratings say.

WEST WIND (40) ran a terrific race to go under by just three parts of a length while pulling well clear of the rest. She'd finished like a rocket over an inadequate mile to take third on her only previous start. As with Coquerelle, it's hard to interpret West Wind's pedigree in a way that suggests she's likely to get a mile and a half. But the two big French fillies races coming up right now are the Prix Saint Alary and the Prix de Diane over 10.5 furlongs. So we can leave questions of stamina till later.

West Wind is most unlucky to have been born in the same year as Coquerelle as she seems sure to run into that filly in most of her obvious target races.

Oddly enough, the last time there was a French three year old filly as fast as Coquerelle was back in 2000 when the brilliant Egyptband was running. Egyptband had two equally fast contemporaries in Reve D'Oscar and Volvoreta and the trio kept running against each other. Now it looks like history is going to repeat itself.

It appears that Coquerelle is just a bit better than West Wind on this run. But Coquerelle can't run in everything so I'd bet on West Wind scoring a Group 1 win of her own sometime this term. The most likely spot would be next time out in the Prix Saint Alary if Coquerelle's connections choose to sidestep that race and keep her fresh for the Prix de Diane.

BIG RUN BY SOLDIER OF FORTUNE

When a three year old runs as fast over a middle distance this early in the year as SOLDIER OF FORTUNE (38) did to take the Prix Noailles they usually go on to at least place in a Classic. The question with Soldier Of Fortune is 'which one?' Will he go for the Prix du Jockey Club on the grounds that he won over the distance here and is a brother to Heliostatic who seems best over ten furlongs? Or will he go for the Epsom Derby over a mile and a half?

It seems likely that the French race will be Soldier Of Fortune's big target as O'Brien announced after the race that the Coolmore colt will again go to France for his next run in the Prix Greffulhe. In the long run though I suspect that Soldier Of Fortune will get a mile and a half. I say this because he was staying on well at the end of a very strongly run 10.5 here, extending his margin over Spirit One all the way to the line. Plus he broke his maiden on soft ground over a mile as a juvenile at Navan, a very testing course.

SPIRIT ONE (37) bounced back to something like top form following moderate runs in the Criterium de Saint-Cloud and on his seasonal debut. Those were both slow run races and it now seems likely that Spirit One only produces his best when asked to set a searching gallop as he did here. The problem with this is that his trainer, Philippe Demercastel, says he tends to idle in front, as most horses do, and as he did here according to his jockey. The solution Demercastel floated was that he might in future employ a pacemaker for Spirit One. This doesn't often produce the desired result in my experience as the jockeys in tend to ignore a pacemaker unless it has a serious chance of winning the race on its own merits. This being so my gut feel though is that Spirit One will prove better than the winner but will do better in Britain and Ireland than in France. And the race I've got him marked down for at this stage is the Irish Derby

SPYCRAWLER (36) has a big reputation and was strongly fancied following an impressive win in a mile maiden last November. He ran a good race, staying on from the back to finish third. I wouldn't dismiss him as a Prix du Jockey Club candidate on this run. After all, he was beaten by two smart horses on his seasonal debut, and he may well improve for the run as so many of Fabre's horses do.