Racing: Giacometti gallops to the front of O'Brien pack

It's official; Aidan O'Brien is human. But he also appears to have the capacity to walk on water. Having forgotten to enter the Derby favourite, Brian Boru, in Sunday's Ballysax Stakes at Leopardstown, he has now ended up with the best of both worlds. Another of the Epsom contenders from Ballydoyle, Alberto Giacometti, will contest the 10-furlong trial and Brian Boru a mock race after the official proceedings. Thus Mick Kinane will be able to test-drive both sons of Sadler's Wells on the same day and under the same conditions.

"I hold my hands up, there was a mix-up in the office about the entries," O'Brien said yesterday at his Co Tipperary fastness that produced the winners of 19 top-level races worldwide last year. "But the people at Leopardstown have kindly allowed me to give Brian Boru a course gallop. It will be more than a gallop, though, it will be run as a proper race. We'll take The Great Gatsby and a couple of others, and I hope we can jump them out of the stalls. The work will be solid."

Brian Boru is already well established in the minds of British racegoers, as winner of the Racing Post Trophy. Alberto Giacometti needs more of an introduction – his Group One win came in the 10-furlong Criterium International at Saint-Cloud in November – but that has not stopped punters latching on to him. In the past few days his Derby odds have shortened from 20-1 to as low as 7-1.

The unbeaten Alberto Giacometti did not make his debut until October. "He's always been an eligible horse," said O'Brien. "He was showing five and six-furlong pace from the start and I had him working as an early two-year-old. But he pulled a muscle, maybe because I was trying him too early. When he came back and won his maiden he had not done a lot of work and 10 days later he won a Group One, a huge achievement."

O'Brien has won the Ballysax in the past two years with Derby winners Galileo and High Chaparral. "When Alberto won in France the ground was very soft," he added, "and I am looking forward to seeing him run on better ground."

The 33-year-old trainer has been unable to split the pair at home. Yesterday they both had an easy breeze on the wood-chip, Alberto Giacometti ridden by Seamus Heffernan and Brian Boru bouncing with well-being under his Japanese partner Kaname. In more serious homework they have stopped the clock virtually identically.

"We use sectional timing over seven furlongs, and the horses always carry the same weights," O'Brien said. "They've been very comfortable and, though they've never worked together, there is not even a second between them. I'll let you work out which is the one in front," he added drily, in an oblique reference to the Alberto gamble, "but remember it is only seven furlongs and it is early days. We'll know more after Sunday."

As well as the first two in the Derby betting, the 2,000 Guineas favourite, Hold That Tiger, strutted his stuff in a dream parade of potential. The Newmarket Classic will be the Storm Cat colt's seasonal debut; after his spectacular success in the Grand Criterium at Longchamp and a fine third in the Breeders' Cup Juvenile, O'Brien has opted for the racecourse gallop route to optimum fitness, leaving as much time as possible before applying the gun.

"After he worked at the Curragh on Sunday he lost only a kilo, but it's amazing how much he has tightened up." he said.

Tomahawk, one of O'Brien's seven winners from 14 runners this season, is likely to be the Ballydoyle flagbearer in the French Guineas, with Spartacus and Statue Of Liberty among the later emergers. Yesterday is nominated as the season's serious filly and Atticus, Solskjaer and Middlemarch as unraced dark horses.

But while the Classic generation is still the centrepiece of proceedings at Ballydoyle, there is a sea-change afoot, with two of last term's star three-year-olds, High Chaparral and Hawk Wing, still gracing the premises. Whisper the G-word softly, but the dominance of Ballydoyle's arch-rivals Godolphin in valuable older-horse races worldwide is responsible. "Both horses are bigger and stronger," O'Brien said. "and if the policy goes well then ultimately it will ease the burden on the three-year-olds. I'm looking forward to the challenge."

* The British Horseracing Board will discuss the findings of the Office of Fair Trading's report into racing for the first time at a board meeting today. "We do not accept that what the OFT has presented is a fait accompli," a spokesman said.