Althiqa flies home in G2 Cape Verdi

Ultra-consistent filly Althiqa gained the biggest success of her career so far when storming home from the rear to take the mile G2 Cape Verdi at Meydan, UAE, on Thursday, 28 January.

The daughter of Dark Angel had won or placed on all seven of her previous starts for Charlie Appleby, including a Listed victory at Deauville and three subsequent placings at G3 level.

James Doyle was happy to switch off Althiqa at the rear of the nine-strong field as Summer Romance strode on into a two-length lead. Althiqa was switched wide entering the straight and showed an impressive turn of foot, heading Summer Romance and Stylistique just inside final furlong, despite drifting into the duo in the process.

She quickened away in the closing stages to score by two and a quarter-lengths from Stylistique.

Dubai Love (Pat Cosgrave) stayed on from off the pace to come home third, a further length in arrears, with Summer Romance (William Buick) fading to fifth.

Charlie Appleby said: “Althiqa is a rock-solid filly, who brought a very consistent profile into this race. James Doyle gave her a lovely patient ride - she is very genuine and put her head down in the right part of the race.

“She ran through the line well and the G2 Balanchine is the obvious route. Stepping up to nine furlongs will be another question mark but she deserves a crack at it and I am sure she will try her best again.

“Summer Romance was a bit fresh early on and it has obviously told late on. We will see how she comes out this race before deciding whether to go for the Balanchine or not.”

James Doyle said: “It worked out nicely. It was a tricky race, as these races always are with not an abundance of runners, and I was trying to work out the race this morning. I thought there were plenty of runners that looked likely to go forward but, whether they actually wanted to force the pace had yet to be seen.

“I was pretty happy to take my time after a furlong as they seemed to be running along at reasonable fractions and Althiqa was nicely relaxed at the back. We started to warm into in on the turn and she showed a good turn of foot in the straight.

“Althiqa has galloped through the line very well and I think it will be worth going up to nine furlongs for the G2 Balanchine. They probably won’t run as quick as they did today over the extra furlong.”