The race might be limited to a select pool of horses but the Inglis Classic can go a long towards confirming a jockey’s opinion of the trainer he is riding for on Saturday.
Peter Robl will partner a last-start bush winner in the $250,000 Inglis Classic at Rosehill but he has been heartened by trainer Matthew Dale’s assesment that Meticulously is much better than country class.
“The horse looked the part at Wagga,” Robl said. “It was a very nice win.
“The Inglis Classic looks a hard race but Matty reckons the horse is up to it so we’ll find out.
“He is a very good judge and it’s not going to surprise me if the horse measures up.”
Meticulously was one of two colts by Not A Single Doubt that Dale spent $70,000 on at last year’s Inglis Classic Sale in Sydney.
He paid $30,000 for Meticulously who, on the merit of his first-up Wagga Wagga win, looks every bit as good as Unanimously did at the same stage of their careers.
Unanimously, yet another son of Not A Single Doubt, has won six races and almost $400,000 in stakes.
Robl was denied an Inglis Classic win last year when his mount Diamond Earth made all the running before being overhauled by Cavalry Rose, the Gerald Ryan-trained filly who was ridden by Glyn Schofield.
Schofield will be fancied to make it back-to-back wins in the race with confirmation he will ride Melbourne colt Direct Charge.
A Flemington winner during the Melbourne Cup carnival, Direct Charge made his Sydney debut when he raced a long way out of his ground before finishing sixth to Swing Vote at Warwick Farm.
Only graduates from last year’s sale can contest Saturday’s race over 1200m.
On that eligibility score, the David Payne-trained Dowdstown Charlie will not run despite figuring among the 20 nominations for the race.
“He’s actually a Magic Millions horse. I nominated him by mistake,” Payne said.
