Sottsass wins Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe as Enable finishes sixth in hat-trick bid
Enable came up short in her bid for an historic third Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe as Sottsass triumphed in testing conditions at Paris-Longchamp.
Third in the race last year, the four-year-old, ridden by Cristian Demuro, gave trainer Jean-Claude Rouget his first Arc success and led home a clean sweep of the places for French-trained horses, with In Swoop second and Persian King in third.
"We've worked all year for this,” Rouget said. “Our entire aim for 2020 was this and it's not been easy with the changes to the calendar.
"We've never been able to do quite what we wanted with the horse. But these last few days I've really felt he was in top form."
In a slowly run race, plenty of horses experienced significant interference but no alterations were made to the result after a stewards’ enquiry.
Enable had won Europe’s most prestigious flat race in 2017 and 2018 but finished second to Waldgeist a year ago in her first hat-trick attempt. She was kept in training as a six-year-old this season with this day in mind but could only finish sixth, bogged down in heavy ground, with stablemate Stradivarius in seventh.
The race had already been hit by the withdrawal of long-time antepost favourite Love at the final declaration stage on account of the ground, and was also without four other Aidan O’Brien runners after they were ruled out after it emerged that their feed had been contaminated with a banned substance.
