Ombudsman will attempt to become the first British-trained winner of the Japan Cup in more than two decades before connections call time on his glittering career.
The superstar five-year-old was last seen when producing a scintillating performance to defeat old rival Calandagan in the Champion Stakes at Ascot, tipping his earnings well over the $7m mark.
Should he go in again when he heads to Tokyo, then he will plunder a $5 million bonus that he qualified for courtesy of his victory on British Champions Day.
Assigned a figure of 131 by the LONGINES World's Best Racehorse Rankings, Ombudsman ranks as the second-highest rated horse in the world behind only star Hong Kong sprinter Ka Ying Rising.
In five visits to the track this year he has only been beaten once, with soft conditions in the Juddmonte International at York to blame for his underperformance. Prior to that, the son of Night Of Thunder recorded a hat-trick of successes in the Dubai Turf, Brigadier Gerard Stakes and, most impressively, in the Prince Of Wales's Stakes at Royal Ascot.
Behind him that day was subsequent British Champions Fillies & Mares Stakes winner Minnie Hauk and Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe winner Daryz - making it one of his most polished performances.
Win number four in the Champion Stakes saw him bag the fifth Group 1 of his career and a sixth is now a possibility before retirement.
It was initially mooted that he would head to the Breeders' Cup Turf at the back end of October, however, father-son training duo John & Thady Gosden have opted to pursue the six-week gap that running in the Japan Cup presents.
Despite Calandagan's epic Japan Cup win in 2025, European success in the race has been thin on the ground.
Alkaseed was the last horse trained in Europe to win the famous Group 1; his victory coming all the way back in 2005. Sir Michael Stoute did train Singspiel and Pilsudski to win the race in back-to-back years in the 1990s, but European participation has been on the decline ever since.
Both Deep Impact and latterly Equinox have gone onto command huge stud fees off the back of their exploits in the Japan Cup and triumph in Tokyo could be one final feather in Ombudsman's cap before he begins his new career as a stallion.
