Damien Oliver will take a two-win premiership lead into the final metropolitan meeting of the season in Victoria as he chases a 10th title.
Oliver added to his season tally with a victory on Volcanic Ash at Caulfield at the penultimate city meeting of the season on Saturday.
Volcanic Ash
His rival for the title, Craig Williams, went winless.
Oliver leads Williams and Dwayne Dunn by two with only six races left at Geelong on Sunday.
Dunn is suspended and is out of contention.
Sunday’s meeting was scheduled for Ballarat but was transferred on Saturday to Geelong because of the heavy track conditions and a forecast for more rain.
Geelong will host the six flat races that were scheduled for Ballarat, but the two jumps features including the Grand National Steeplechase will be rescheduled.
Both Oliver and Williams looked to have strong books of rides at Caulfield but Oliver was beaten in a photo finish in the first race while Williams finished second in three races on the program.
“We both had some nice rides today but we probably didn’t ride as many winners as we kind of thought we might have,” Oliver said.
“But you’ve got to be happy going into the final day with a lead.”
Oliver and Williams have full books of rides on Sunday.
“I’m hopeful but never too confident in this game,” Oliver said.
“If you looked at our rides today you would have swore that we would have probably ridden more winners than we did.
“It just goes to show, you can have a lot of the good rides and not always get the winners.”
