Dettori expects 'the real Enable' in Breeders' Cup Turf

Prince Khalid Abdulla’s Enable will try to accomplish the first Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe and Breeders’ Cup double when she is saddled Saturday for the Breeders’ Cup Turf at Churchill Downs. Likewise, jockey Frankie Dettori is also hoping for the accomplishment having come close in years past.

“Enable, she needs no introduction,” Dettori said Wednesday at Churchill Downs. “She’s the best over a mile and a half on the turf basically these last couple of years. She won three Oaks, the King George against the boys and then the Arc, then she came back and won the Arc again. Just showed that she still has maintained her brilliance.”

In 2001 Dettori finished second in the Breeders’ Cup Classic with Sakhee behind Tiznow and in 2015, Golden Horn was caught by the filly Found in the Breeders’ Cup Turf. Both were coming off their own Arc wins.

Helping Enable and Dettori in their quest is the 4-year-old filly's light season. A knee issue prevented her from returning in the spring, and she won the Arc off of one prep race in September over a polytrack surface. She then held off rising star Sea of Class to repeat in the Arc.

From 10 starts, she was won nine times and raced in England, Ireland and France. The Breeders' Cup will mark her first overseas start.

“With horses, you never know when you travel them halfway around the world,” Dettori said. “With Enable, unfortunately she can’t speak our language. We can only look at her. She looks fine. The good thing, she is relatively a fresh filly. She’s only run twice. I just hope for the world that the real Enable turns up and just show to the world how great she can be.”

As great as Enable looked in her two races this season, Dettori said she was rusty from all the time off when he first got back on her. The John Gosden-trained filly began to improve with each work and, after showing Europe what she can accomplish, Dettori is excited for the opportunity to share her with another part of the world.

“She’s my favorite,” he said. “Every time I ride her I feel emotional. It’s not every day that you step on a horse at this magnitude and this brilliance. Everybody in Europe knows how good she is, so if she can come here and conquer America it’d be something amazing.”