ANTHONY Delpech will be riding champion mare Igugu at work in Dubai on Thursday morning on the eve of this weekend’s Super Saturday meeting at Meydan. The 2012 J&B Met winner will run in the Gr1 Jebel Hatta over 1800m on Saturday.

An elated Avontuur-sponsored Delpech was thrilled to get the call up from the De Kock yard to ride his beloved champion after she’d finished third in the 1800m Gr2 Balanchine a fortnight ago. In her first run in 13 months, she was beaten  4.25 lengths in the hands of Christophe Soumillon by Godolphin’s smart filly Sajjhaaa.  Soumillon will partner The Apache in the Jebel Hatta.

Igugu’s failure to win after all the hype around her was a great disappointment to some of her followers, but De Kock did advise pre-race that she was short of her peak and that victory on her international debut would be no foregone conclusion.

Delpech jets out of South Africa on Wednesday evening and returns to the scene of some of his greatest triumphs. In what he termed a ‘special moment in my career’, he said that his wife Candice would be there to share it with him as his children had school commitments.

In  2001 he won the joint-richest turf race in the world, the Sheema Classic in 2007 for David Ferraris on one of his favourite horses, Vengeance of Rain, while based in Hong Kong.

Delpech brings plenty of international experience to the table and beyond Hong Kong and Dubai, has also ridden in Japan, Singapore and Mauritius. As a family man, he has settled in South Africa and generally does not travel with three young children in the house.

“I will be riding work on Thursday morning and I am due back in South Africa on Sunday afternoon. I am very excited and it is no secret that I have wanted to ride for Mike in Dubai for so long and it has finally come together,” he said with pride.

When taxed on how he felt, he said that he was obviously nervous:

“One wouldn’t be human not to feel nervous about the occasion. But I am also very excited. I know that the whole of SA will be watching and expecting Igugu to set the record straight. So that is a lot of pressure and expectation but she has shown how good she is and I know how good she is. She will be a fitter horse this time, and I just hope that everything goes well for us in the race.”

The 1800m race is one of two Gr1 races on the Super Saturday card, and a final stepping stone into the Dubai World Cup at end of March.

Mike De Kock won this race last year in the same silks with the former Aiden O’Brien trained Master of Hounds, who led from  start to finish to win the $300,000 event. – extracts from Sporting Post.