Timeform's David Cleary reflects on Saturday's Group 1 feature - the Darley Dewhurst Stakes won by Shadow Of Light.
The latest running of the Dewhurst Stakes turned out not to be quite the race that had been anticipated.
The crack-of-dawn withdrawal of the hot favourite The Lion In Winter removed the potential for the Acomb winner to establish himself firmly as the best two-year-old colt of the campaign.
Instead, in his absence, the Middle Park winner Shadow of Light became just the second horse since Diesis in 1982 to complete the Middle Park-Dewhurst double.
Shadow of Light didn't run to the level he'd achieved in the Middle Park, but he scored a gritty win in adverse circumstances. Despite there being just five runners, the field raced as two groups wide apart, Ryan Moore on Expanded coming right over to the stand rail with James Doyle on the strong-travelling Ancient Truth following him across.
With a furlong and a half to run, Ancient Truth looked to have the measure of the once-raced Expanded, the race between the pair, but the latter rallied and Shadow of Light, battling on, drifted left to join the pair, getting up late on. With margins of a neck and the same, this was hardly a vintage Dewhurst, the winner no City of Troy or Pinatubo.
That said, the form would be on a par with that shown by Chaldean and he managed to land the Guineas at three. One point Shadow of Light's win does highlight is his stamina.
There was talk after the Middle Park that he would be aimed at the Commonwealth Cup, but his pedigree suggested a Guineas campaign would be worth pursuing and this win fully supports that.
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