Golden Slipper winner Pierro has delivered a knockout blow to boom colt All Too Hard with a decisive victory in the Group One Sires’ Produce Stakes at Randwick.
“There was nothing too hard about that was there?” winning trainer Gai Waterhouse said.
“I’ve said from day one how good he is.
“He has won every race he’s gone in and still people question him.”
Waterhouse was responding to the hype surrounding Black Caviar’s half-brother All Too Hard who missed the Golden Slipper in favour of the Sires (1400m) and was sent out the $1.65 favourite ahead of last week’s Slipper winner.
Both colts went into the race unbeaten with Pierro’s record now five from five while All Too Hard has one loss from four starts.
All Too Hard came out of the gates last and tacked on to the field with Nash Rawiller content to let Pierro settled midfield with Raceway setting the pace.
Dwayne Dunn moved up on All Too Hard to track Pierro in the straight as the pair got set for the battle.
But it was no contest as Pierro strode clear to win by 1-3/4 lengths in 1:21.47 to better the great Luskin Star’s standard of 1:21.50 set in 1977.
The dominance of the win prompted Rawiller into a rare display of emotion as he raised his whip high in the air going to the post.
“He is unbelievable,” Rawiller said.
“He relaxed beautifully and I let them go in front because I didn’t want to get involved in a battle up there.
“I took a look behind me because I wanted to see how well they were going behind me.
“If he comes back as a three-year-old who’s to say he’s not as good as his father.”
Pierro’s sire Lonhro was a champion in his own right although not as precocious at two and he did not contest the Slipper.
He went on to rack up Group One wins in the care of John Hawkes over the following three seasons.
One race he didn’t win was the Cox Plate but Waterhouse hinted his son might do so.
“Look at the way he donkey-licked them over 1400 metres, what will he do over 2000,” she said.
Coincidentally Hawkes trains All Too Hard with his sons Michael and Wayne for Nathan Tinkler.
“He wasn’t good enough on the day,” Hawkes said.
“Pierro is a good horse. Any horse who has done what he has done, you don’t knock them.”
Neither trainer would commit to a start in the Champagne Stakes (1600m) in two weeks with both saying they would let the dust settle.
“We’ll just see how he pulls up,” Waterhouse said of Pierro.”
Lonhro stands at Darley Australia with Sheikh Mohammed’s operation represented in the Sires’ by 100-1 chance Limes who finished a solid third, a head behind All Too Hard.
