Globe-trotting State of Rest bids for a first Group 1 on home turf

Don’t be fooled by his name. State of Rest might conjure up notions of sitting still but nothing could be further from the truth for a horse who must have clocked up more air-miles than most in the last twelve months and has had a hugely lucrative time doing so.

When he last ran at the Curragh he was third in a Listed race on Irish Derby day last June. Now he returns there on Sunday with a very different looking cv as a leading contender for the Group 1 Tattersalls Gold Cup. His three runs in the meantime have brought him three top level prizes on three different continents, earning his connections the equivalent of well over two million pounds.

The furthest State of Rest had travelled this time last year for Joseph O’Brien had been to Doncaster where he ended his two-year-old campaign with two runs, finishing third to Chindit in the Champagne Stakes – his best effort at two – and then fifth to Mac Swiney – one of his rivals again on Sunday – in the Futurity Trophy. However, after that run at the Curragh last June State of Rest was found a good opportunity at Grade 1 level in the States when winning the Saratoga Derby and an even bigger pot awaited him on the other side of the world a couple of months later. With a first prize equating to around £1.7m, the Cox Plate at Moonee Valley is Australia’s most prestigious weight-for-age contest, though it took twenty minutes for State of Rest’s short-head victory to be confirmed after an inquiry looked into possible interference.

Back in third in the Cox Plate, incidentally, was the prolific Group 1-winning mare Verry Elleegant who went on to win the Melbourne Cup soon afterwards and has recently been transferred to Francis-Henri Graffard’s stable for an Arc bid later in the year. France was also State of Rest’s latest destination as he made a successful return in the Prix Ganay at Longchamp last month with his best effort yet to beat a very smart field that included Graffard’s Champion Stakes winner from last year Sealiway.

You could say that globe-trotting is in State of Rest’s blood. His sire and grandsire were the Australian-bred sprinters Starspangledbanner and Choisir who themselves enjoyed top-level success in both hemispheres. Choisir was the first of several Australian sprinters to triumph at Royal Ascot, completing an historic double in the King’s Stand and what was then the Golden Jubilee in 2003. His son won the Golden Jubilee and July Cup seven years later, though Starspangledbanner had been bought by Coolmore by then and won those races for Aidan O’Brien. By the end of his racing career – Starspangledbanner was put back into training after his first stint as a stallion proved unsuccessful – Joseph O’Brien had become his regular jockey.

O’Brien’s riding career was brief but one of the things he must have learned during his time riding the best horses at Ballydoyle was about the rewards to be had from international campaigns. He enjoyed particular success with St Nicholas Abbey, the first horse trained in Britain or Ireland to win more than £5m in prize money. As well as partnering him to two of his three wins in the Coronation Cup, O’Brien became the youngest winning rider in Breeders’ Cup history when winning the Turf on him at the age of 18, while their victory in the Dubai Sheema Classic in 2013 put St Nicholas Abbey in the select group of European-based horses to have won Group/Grade 1 races on three different continents, a club which State of Rest has now also joined.

It was natural therefore that, provided he had horses good enough, O’Brien would chase big prizes abroad once making the switch from riding to training. In just his second year with a licence, O’Brien won the 2017 Melbourne Cup with Rekindling before winning it again three years later with Twilight Payment. While his father still hasn’t won the Melbourne Cup despite trying for a lot longer, Aidan O’Brien paved the way for his son’s success in the Cox Plate when becoming the first European trainer to win it with another three-year-old, Adelaide in 2014. Like State of Rest, Adelaide had also won a Grade 1 in the States (the Secretariat Stakes at Arlington) beforehand, while Joseph O’Brien had partnered the colt to victory in the Gallinule Stakes at the Curragh earlier that year.

Another notable early training success abroad for Joseph O’Brien was Iridessa’s win in the 2019 Breeders’ Cup Filly & Mare Turf which also made him the youngest trainer to win a race at the meeting and only the second successful trainer at the Breeders’ Cup, after Freddie Head, to have also ridden a winner there.

If State of Rest does win the Tattersalls Gold Cup on Sunday he won’t be the first Cox Plate winner to do so. In fact, So You Think won two editions of both races. So You Think was another Coolmore purchase from down under where he also finished third in the Melbourne Cup. But his globe-trotting wasn’t over once he joined Ballydoyle as he also contested, without success, the Arc, Breeders’ Cup Classic and Dubai World Cup. Joseph O’Brien was in the saddle for his second win in the Tattersalls Gold Cup in 2012 and for the final victory of his career in the Prince of Wales’s Stakes.

So You Think, therefore, was not one of the few European-trained horses to have won a Group/Grade 1 prize on three different continents. By our reckoning, the number who have done so remains in single figures, even taking State of Rest into account. Besides St Nicholas Abbey, Highland Reel is another from Ballydoyle to have achieved that feat. So too have the Godolphin trio of Sulamani, Fantastic Light and Benbatl, Sir Michael Stoute’s pair Singspiel and Pilsudski, and the Ed Dunlop-trained mare Ouija Board. Unlike most of those horses, what State of Rest doesn’t yet have is a Group 1 win on home turf so a win on Sunday would no doubt be a welcome addition to his collection.

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