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Just Glamorous chance in Abbaye

Just Glamorous
Image: Just Glamorous: Big hope in the Abbaye

Ron Harris feels that whatever Just Glamorous does in the Prix de l'Abbaye at Chantilly on Sunday he will be a force to be reckoned with in all the top sprints next year.

Only a three-year-old, it is a generally accepted rule that sprinters do not reach full maturity until later in their career.

With that in mind what Harris has achieved with Just Glamorous this season is nothing short of remarkable.

Beaten off a handicap mark of 69 at Wolverhampton in May, he has subsequently won four races and last time out over the same course and distance he faces this weekend he bolted up by three lengths in a Group Three.

That day he had last year's Abbaye winner Goldream back in third with Sir Mark Prescott's Marsha second, and both those take him on again but it is hard to see them closing the gap, especially given his plum draw next to the rail in stall two.

Harris will be having his first ever runner in a Group One and said: "It's all very exciting.

"One thing we do know, though, is that even if he gets beaten he's likely to be back for it next year.

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"It will be his 11th run of the season, but with each one he's become more of a man and improved for them.

"I know one day that won't be true but it certainly looked like he'd improved last time out.

"He's only three but looking at him in the paddock before his last race there was no one on earth that would have picked him out as a three-year-old.

"Sprinters don't usually peak until they are four or five, so it's all in front of him, really.

"I'm a big believer in times and if you compared Mecca's Angel from the Nunthorpe and ours from when we ran at York with top weight, there wouldn't be much between them.

"Having a horse like this is what his owner (Robert Bailey) has always dreamed of and what he's always wanted to do is travel.

"I'm trying my hardest to keep his feet on the ground and telling him to take each race as it comes.

"It wouldn't surprise me, though, if he became a bit of a globetrotter."

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