Jamie Lynch's Weekend Preview: Walking before you can run

If you were an Italian expat living in Yorkshire (mi piace quello che io dico e dire quello che mi piace - I like what I say and I say what I like) with a sense of community spirit and a passing interest in horse racing, then last weekend was a brilliant one. Italy beat up England in the quarter-finals of the Euros, but not before the neighbourhood came out as one to see the Olympic torch paraded through the streets, and those who dipped into racing were treated to the theatrical drama of Black Caviar. Meanwhile, I who support England was underwhelmed by the football; I who baulk at the term 'big society' was underwhelmed by the torch and trappings (but overwhelmed by the bloke two along who was handed a commemorative inflatable and immediately set about selling it on); and I who was ready and waiting for socks to be knocked off by Black Caviar was underwhelmed by her scramble.

Of course that wasn't Black Caviar at her best, for all the reasons expertly set out in the latest profound article by Simon Rowlands, including track, jockey, ground, jockey, pace, jockey, travel, and the jockey. The travel factor is the one that interests me most, but the hardest to quantify. There's no calculating to what extent travelling so far for so long affects performance, particularly as it's obviously dependent on the individual, the impact differing from horse to horse, but suffice to say allowances need to be made. Let's say, just for fun, we'll allow half-a-pound for every hour travelled. Black Caviar's journey took 30 hours, therefore equating to 15 lb, which, added to her bare rating from the Diamond Jubilee, actually makes it one of her best performances in her career. Mystery solved, handicappers relieved, and Australians pacified. The only thing is that, using that pounds-per-hours scale, Frankel isn't the best horse in history after all: it's Cyprian.

In 1836, before the days of railways and horseboxes, Cyprian was walked - yes, walked - from Malton in North Yorkshire to Epsom Downs where she won the Oaks. She was then walked - yes, walked - from Epsom Downs to Newcastle where she won the Northumberland Plate. It took two months in total. Cyprian's revised Timeform rating is 804. Citing that 'there was no yardstick horse but she was probably no better than Dancing Brave or Frankel', the BHA have left her on 139.

Besides the mind-blowing achievement, Cyprian's story is revealing about the standing of the Northumberland Plate, or Pitmen's Derby as it's often still referred, back in the day. It was a huge event in its time, known as 'Race Week', and the meeting featured plenty of side attractions such as chimney sweeps racing on donkeys, something which lives on today through hunter chases.

The Northumberland Plate remains one of the most prestigious and valuable handicaps of the season, worth £140,000, and, weather permitting, a maximum field of 20, all of whom will have been chauffeured in comfort and not walked to the track, will chase the big prize. We know almost everything about most of the 20. Motivado is an exception.

According to Timeform ratings, Motivado is the best-handicapped horse in the race, even over and above Gold Cup-fourth Gulf of Naples who isn't so good as he was made to look by dictating a steady pace at Royal Ascot, plus he has to get over the twin peaks of a quick turnaround and stall 17. On the other hand, Motivado has an ideal draw and arrives here fresh, too fresh for some who'll be put off by the 280-day absence, but this is Sir Mark Prescott we're dealing with, a man who knows what hand he's got and when to play it, and it's significant that a) he's kept him at all when Motivado is the sort of imposing, progressive horse who would fetch around the £300,000 mark for jumping, and b) Prescott has saved him up in terms of his mark and untapped stamina for this big day.

The ground is an unknown, as it will be for most of the field, but there's some encouragement in that regard in his pedigree, the dam - a Group winner in France - effective on heavy, and Motivado himself shaped okay under similar conditions at this very track on his debut, which was only nine races ago for him, highlighting that he has very few miles on the clock compared to the rest. And he has a top-notch jockey, one who can single-handedly restore the riding reputation of Lukes around the world.

Question: Name the Three Tenors.

If you're like me, and most others here at Timeform following a quick straw poll, then you're straight in with Pavarotti. For Pavarotti, see Frankel. Then, after a bit more thought, it's Placido Domingo, who's naturally Black Caviar. Camelot must feel like Jose Carreras did, one of the 'big three' of his time but, through no fault of his own, outperformed and overshadowed by the other two after their solo efforts on the same stage last week, but Camelot gets the mic all to himself this weekend, a chance for a memorable rendition of his own.

Camelot is so far ahead of the opposition in the Irish Derby, and the three-year-olds in general, that it will take something special from him on Saturday to make us say anything other than 'so what', but to think like that is to underestimate the star he already is and the superstar he could become. If Pavarotti and Domingo weren't around, we'd have lauded Carreras as a phenomenon, a one-off, and the same goes for Camelot. He's rated higher by Timeform than Sea The Stars was at the same stage of career, and Camelot has the potential to accomplish as much...and more.

Camelot will win the Irish Derby, and fingers crossed he wins it by a long way, to reclaim some of his due limelight, but there's little to be gained in backing him at odds-on. The way to play it for financial gain is the straight forecast with him and stablemate Imperial Monarch, who's definitely a Group 1 horse in his own right and was unlucky not to prove the point in the French Derby, or a place lay of Born To Sea, a horse whose myth still to some extent colours the reality but in actual fact is becoming less convincing by the run, and this departure in trip isn't the way to go with him. In the end, though, the Irish Derby is all about Camelot, but however far he wins by he'll do well to usurp Cyprian at the top of the recalibrated all-time Timeform rankings.

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