ENGLISH TEXTS
PAGE 124 As the Chantilly site is classified as a historic monument , the synthetic turf installed on the racecourse had to be the same light color as the stone of the château and the grand stables ! © APRH
PAGE 125 KING GOLD during his victory in the Gr . 1 Prix Maurice de Gheest . © APRH
PAGE 126 LEFT Chantilly ’ s synthetic turf .
PAGE 126 RIGHT Deauville ’ s grass track . © APRH
PAGE 127 The American Dirt track . © APRH
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CANDY RIDE , AN EXCEPTION TO PROVE THE RULE
Bloodstock agent Hubert Guy likes to say that there are “ two breeds of Thoroughbred in the United States , dirt horses and turf horses .“ Stallions that have managed to dominate both worlds are extremely rare , as the qualities required to perform on turf and dirt differ so much . The great sire Northern Dancer ( Nearco ), born in 1961 , was one of them . Standing at 1.56m , muscular and with an extraordinary action , Northern Dancer only raced once on turf , at the age of two ( victory in Canada in the Summer Stakes , now a Gr . 1 ).
Five of the championships he won were on dirt . This did not prevent Northern Dancer from becoming the most emblematic stallion of the 20 th century and producing turf stars , starting with his sons and grandson Sadler ’ s Wells and Galileo ! The Argentinian Candy Ride is following in his footsteps . At the age of twenty-six , he is still active at Lane ’ s End in Kentucky , where his fee is $ 75,000 . “ His sire , Ride The Rails , was an American dirt horse exported to Argentina . His dam Candy Girl was a native mare more oriented towards turf ,“ explains Hubert Guy . “ Candy Ride remained unbeaten in six races and won Group 1 races on all surfaces : dirt , turf and even polytrack when he beat Medaglia d ’ Oro over 2,000m in the Pacific Classic at Del Mar in 2003 , setting a new track record .“ In Argentina , Candy Ride had also broken the world record for the mile , on turf ! A versatile champion who became an exceptional sire of sires . “ Candy Ride is certainly the best ‘ import ’ made to the United States , a stallion capable of producing both dirt and turf horses - and stallions ,“ analyses Hubert Guy . The bay is the sire of Gun Runner ( 2013 ), a star stallion in the USA , winner of six Group 1 races on dirt including the 2017 Breeders ’ Cup Classic , and who has earned fifteen million dollars . Gun Runner is the sire of Sierra Leone , who has just emulated him by also winning the Breeders ’ Cup Classic under Flavien Prat . Candy Ride is also the sire of the stallions Twirling Candy ( 2007 ), who has produced Group 1 winners on dirt but also on turf , and Vekoma ( 2016 ), the leading first-season sire in the United States in 2024 .
His offspring also seem to shine with their versatility .
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ALL-WEATHER TRACKS , SURFACES TO PAMPER
Many French racecourses are equipped with an all-weather track , those where racing takes place in winter and which host enough meetings to justify a substantial investment : Chantilly , Deauville , Pornichet , Pau , Marseille- Vivaux , Lyon la Soie , Cagnes ... These surfaces are , as their name suggests , a mixture of sand and various recycled plastic or textile fibres , bound together by a kind of petroleum jelly . The resurfacing of the Cagnessur-Mer track in 2022 required a budget of 3.2 million euros , given that it covers six hectares . The old track was removed , the draining asphalt that forms the first layer was completely redone before the all-weather surface was laid to a thickness of fifteen centimetres . At Chantilly , the all-weather track dates from 2011 and has since undergone two major renovations , the addition of fibres in 2019 and then oil in 2023 . Marin Le Cour Grandmaison , head of the Chantilly site for France Galop , explains that the maintenance of all-weather tracks is extremely technical and meticulous : “ There are a lot of race meetings in February-March at our racecourse and so we harrow often during this period . If you always do it at the same depth ,
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