His lowly beginning was on a chicken and cattle ranch in Arizona, so he knows about the desert conditions he will encounter in Sunday’s $5m Dubai World Cup, the richest race in the world.
Baffert’s Silver Charm is the first horse to return to the Emirates to protect a World Cup crown and if he succeeds he will be within snorting distance of the great Cigar’s earnings record He is favourite and reported in peak condition by his team. The grey endured a six-hour stopover in Amsterdam on the way to the Middle East and may have popped into a coffeee shop during the sojourn, as he was reported to have arrived in an unusually relaxed condition.Silver Charm’s work has been solid, but there is a residual suspicion that the many hard races he has endured in a 22-race career have eroded him. The five-year-old has lost his last two races and even connections believe he might now be vulnerable.The horse is owned by Robert and Beverly Lewis, who know how to keep their friends. Two years ago, when Silver Charm was just a Belmont Stakes away from completing the North American Triple Crown, they chartered a plane to fly 100 to New York and then put them up in Long Island’s Garden City Hotel. There were plenty of shoulders to cry on when Touch Gold wore down their hero in the last 70 yards.Baffert won the Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes again last year with Real Quiet, but his attempts to join the Hall Of Famers was tripped up by Victory Gallop, another of Sunday’s contestants. Victory Gallop was bred by the Tall Oaks Farm of Ivan and Irene Dalos They first became involved in the game in 1986. “Our first horse finished 27 lengths back in last place in my first time as an owner,” Ivan says.

“That one was a total disaster but I think we’ve improved from there.”Favourite for last place on Sunday is Philip Mitchell’s Running Stag, who drew the No 8 stall yesterday and is expected to finish in the same place. Allocation of stalls positions for a mile and a quarter contest with just eight runners may seem a limited factor, but there was much fanfare yesterday. Representatives of each horse selected their berth by pulling hoods from the heads of solid silver falcons Bo Derek was there. The whole affair just about outshone Graham Kelly and his bag of balls.Sunday’s other runners include a third American consideration of Richard Mandella’s Malek, plus the formidable home quartet of Godolphin’s High- Rise, Daylami, Almutawakel and Central Park.High-Rise, the 1998 Derby winner, is the choice of Frankie Dettori for a combat under floodlights which will be witnessed by 30,000 on course at Nad Al Sheba and a further 200m television viewers in over 200 countries.n The Dubai World Cup will be shown live at 5.15pm on BBC2’s Sunday Grandstand. There will also be live coverage of the Dubai Duty Free at 4.30pm..

THE WOMEN’S singles at the Lipton Championships here, which has generated more general interest than the men’s event because of the variety of style and personality on view, suffered its first setback yesterday when Lindsay Davenport, the American world No 2 withdrew from her quarter- final against Steffi Graf because of a sprained left wrist she has nursed since damaging the joint while practising five days earlier. Graf was relishing the contest, having displayed fine form here, where she is unbeaten in 20 matches. In the semi-finals she will play either Venus Williams, the defending champion, or renew her rivalry with Jana Novotna.
Otherwise the women’s tournament continues to bubble along nicely. It was probably no more than the proximity to Miami, where people have been made offers they could not refuse, that caused eyebrows to be raised when Serena Williams used the phrase: “We have a lot of business to deal with out there” in relation to her match today against Martina Hingis in the semi-finals.Nothing sinister was intended, however. Asked what kind of business she meant, Williams shrugged and said: “I have to go out and play. I have a job next time I play.”Serena Williams, 17, the younger of the powerful American tennis sisters, is in splendid form, having won consecutive WTA Tour titles, indoors at the Paris Open and outdoors at the Evert Cup, in Indian Wells, California. On Wednesday night at the Lipton she won her 15th match in a row, defeating the South African, Amanda Coetzer, 6-4, 6-0.Hingis, 18, the world No 1, won the fifth Grand Slam title of her career at the Australian Open in January and has only conceded 11 games in her four matches here, requiring only 43 minutes to dispatch Austria’s Barbara Schett in the quarter-finals, 6-1, 6-1.

The Swiss won her two previous matches against Williams last year, although Williams held two match points in their quarter-final at the Lipton, Hingis going on to lose to Venus Williams in the semi-finals.”I had two match points last year?” Serena asked, affecting surprise when the subject was raised. “It must really not be on my mind.” She might have been more concerned with the way Coetzer attacked her serve in the opening set on Wednesday. “I didn’t play so well in the first set at all,” Williams said. “I guess I was a little tired in the beginning, but I was able to come through.”She will need to be firing from the start against Hingis, who is unlikely to be lulled by Williams’ observation that: “I don’t have anything to lose – she’s No 1, I’m No 16.” Williams added: “She didn’t get to No 1 by just joking around She was serious. I think I saw her mom here tonight, so I’m sure she was at my match watching me, trying to get the latest scouting report.