The Festival’s Shaikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan Cup race series, which has been staged at leading racecourses in the US, Australia, France, Germany, Poland, Morocco will now visit the famous St Moritz and become part of the White Turf legend.

St Moritz comes alive with about 30,000 horse racing fans at these unique race-meetings on the frozen lake of St. Moritz during the first three Sundays in February every year. And this year the Shaikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan Global Arabian Flat Racing Festival’s Shaikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan Cup will see over half a dozen Purebred Arabian horses display their racing skills at this historic event.

“Every winter St. Moritz hosts the ‘White Turf’ horse race on the frozen St Moritz lake and by becoming part of this race meeting on the important third Sunday (February 17) gives the series a new status and a huge boost to Purebred Arabian racing,” said Lara Sawaya, director of the Shaikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan Global Arabian Flat Racing Festival and Head of Ladies Racing in IFAHR.

“The race will be run over a distance of 1,800 metres on the frozen track and we have some horses that have already taken part in the Festival’s racing making this historic trip,” she added.

Seven horses have entered for this Euro 25,000 race with Germany’s 2012 champion Fanal Al Samawi also in the starting line-up.

The 5-year-old chestnut son of Ainhoa St Faust had an impressive run of four wins between July and September last year and in his last start was second to Paramour T in October.

Apart from Fanal Al Samawi, trainer Karen R. van den Bos, who has had some success in the Festival’s races, will be represented by Djetkan, third to Ijad in the Shaikha Fatima bint Mubarak Ladies World Championship IFAHR.

Other runners include Badjy, Swiss raiders Nil Ashal, Nil Karazi, Logudorese from Itlay and Ghilali from France.

Apart from the horse racing, the frozen lake of St Moritz also hosts the world famous Polo Championship while St. Moritz has been the host city for the 1928 and 1948 Winter Olympics. It also hosted the 1934, 1974 and 2003 World Alpine Skiing Championships.