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The story
Late at night on October 4, 2026, the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe 2026 was run at Longchamp Racecourse in France, and reactions poured into a live-commentary thread on 5ch (a major Japanese forum). As for Japanese entrants Tabal do Gal and Admire Tera, a wave of harsh comments rolled in over concerns about the distance and whether they suit Longchamp’s turf, with one post comparing their chances of winning to “another Shohei Ohtani-level talent showing up in baseball.” Still, the thread was a mix of pessimism and jokes — some held out hope for the 3-year-old filly’s challenge, others reported handing their picks over to AI and betting on its advice, and some just riffed on the race as one of “autumn’s seasonal traditions,” right up there with Beaujolais Nouveau and Haruki Murakami’s Nobel Prize odds.
Post time: 23:05
No. 1 Daryz (jockey M. Barzalona) — Gate 5
No. 2 Sadad (jockey R. Dawson) — Gate 9
Source: youtube.com / original article here
What people said
Probably a bit better than last year, but last year there was zero chance to begin with, so comparing the two doesn't mean much.
In baseball terms, it's about as likely as another Shohei Ohtani-level player coming along.
Really? It's gotten less buzz than usual this year, so I figured that was a bad sign.
I'd guess it'll stand out about as much as Danchō Yasuda's Akasaka marathon stunt (a comedian famous for absurd, over-the-top viral challenges).
Will a Japanese horse finally win the Arc?
Will Haruki Murakami finally win the Nobel Prize?
How's this year's Beaujolais Nouveau taste?
Those are the real signs of fall.
Love that this is being streamed live from a café in Koenji.
If it hits, that's ¥100,000.
About as long as Magnum Tokyo's entrance (a drag performer famous for absurdly drawn-out stage entrances).
Equinox, maybe?
Can't picture that horse running well at Longchamp — feels like he'd just be grinding down the stretch and it'd be over before he got there.
Given the distance and track suitability, it's just not happening.
A 3-year-old filly good enough to take on the world doesn't come around that often.
"Vega, but it's Hokuto Vega!" — now that's a classic line (a famous racetrack announcer's catchphrase for the beloved Japanese mare Hokuto Vega).
That's Announcer Baba for you — "cherry blossoms in full bloom during chrysanthemum season" (riffing on a legendary racecaller's iconic line, with a pun since "Baba" also means "racetrack").
And of course, that's exactly when the track turns bone-dry and fast, and the dirt horse becomes useless.
Background and Key Points of This Topic
The Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe is a Group 1 race run over 2,400 meters on turf at Longchamp Racecourse in France, widely regarded as Europe’s most prestigious race. Japanese horses have challenged it repeatedly without ever winning — El Condor Pasa finished second in 1999, and Orfevre finished second around 2010–2012 — and that history is why the thread rates the Japanese entrants so low. Longchamp’s soft turf and the way its races are run are fundamentally different from Japan’s fast tracks, and whether Japanese horses can handle those conditions is a question that comes up every single year. In the thread, pessimism dominated the question of whether any horse looked capable of winning this year, though a few posts floated the idea of a 3-year-old filly making a run, hinting at differing views by generation and sex of horse. Note that this article excerpts posts made around the time of the race’s start and does not cover the actual result.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Nandemo Jikkyo G) thread “[LIVE] Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe 2026.”
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