Qatar Racing Limited-owned Kameko bounced back in the Shadwell Joel Stakes (Group 2), at Newmarket yesterday with a fantastic victory.
The three-year-old trained by Andrew Balding had not won since his success in the 1,000 Guineas (Group 1) in a record time at Newmarket in May.
Yesterday, Kameko, under Oisin Murphy, chased the leaders in the Shadwell Joel Stakes and, despite looking a little lethargic early on, he showed a good turn of foot in the last two furlongs to win by half-a-length in front of Regal Reality while Benbatl finished a further half-a-length behind in third.
Kameko was one of the two three-year-olds in the race and, being a Group 1 winner, he had to give some weight to his elders.
Murphy said, “There’s a lot of pressure on the fastest Guineas winner ever, but there were no options for him and I don’t think there have been many three-year-olds that could give weight to horses like Benbatl. He’s definitely a miler and he might get an easy ten (furlongs) on fast ground, but it would be nice to make him as good a racehorse as he can be. So much hard work has gone into him to keep him sound and organised. It’s a huge team effort. 
“Sheikh Fahad buys plenty of horses and breeds as best he can to find champion horses and now he’s found two.”
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