Multiple Brisbane Metropolitan Trainers Premiership winner Tony Gollan will be looking to flex the stable’s muscles at Grafton today where the powerful yard has the seasoned Outback Barbie and Garibaldi engaged in the $200 000, Listed Ramornie Handicap over 1200m.
Outback Barbie needs no introduction. The five-year-old Spirit Of Boom mare came back a winner of the Bright Shadow three runs back over the Ramornie distance and, although unplaced, did herself proud in her two subsequent starts … both in group 1 company … in the Kingsford-Smith Plate, against the likes of Vega One, Jonker and Trekking … and the Stradbroke, against a host of quality performers in a race won by Tofane.
Outback Barbie has won four times at Listed level … in fact she has never been out of the first three in Listed company (in six starts), a class she tackles here. But, better than that, twenty-two of her thirty-four starts have come in Group races, six at Group 1 level, and she also has the distinction of participating in the highly competitive Magic Millions Day for four years in a row from a two year-old in the Magic Millions Two-Year-Old Classic, where she finished third behind Sunlight, through to the current season.
Credentials aplenty there for the Ramornie so Outback Barbie will certainly deserve every respect … particularly as this will be her last race, so expect her to come out firing as she looks to go out with a bang!
“The Kingsford-Smith run was a good run,” said Gollan, “and the Stradbroke run was probably better than the margin looked. She got sort of cut out late and she should have been a couple of lengths closer … so both of those runs at Group 1 level were good. In the run before that, when she got on soft ground at Doomben (in the Bright Shadow), she was really good.”
Outback Barbie has had four different riders in her last four starts, and she gets another new jockey here in the form of Stephanie Thornton.
“Stephanie is riding terrific,” said Gollan, “but, look, Barbie knows her way around the racetrack by now. This is her last run. I think Steph will do a fine job on her. I’ll just let her thing … don’t over-ride her. It’s simple.”
Garibaldi also provides the Gollan stable with strong representation.
A winner of four races in a row from November 2020 until February 2021, the son of I Am Invincible finished second first-up when resuming after a two-and-a-half month layoff and then finished out of the placings, but not far back at all, in his two subsequent starts in the Group 3 BRC Sprint and the Listed Hinkler Handicap.
“His first up run he probably should have won,” said Gollan. ‘That was pretty well documented. People were raving about him after that and he was right in Stradbroke calculations and everything … but then we went to the 1350m (in the BRC Sprint) and he just probably didn’t quite get the trip
“He raced a little close and a little bit too much in the bridle … and in the last half furlong he was flat out. I’ve always thought there was a risk with him at 1350m because he is a horse that can over-race a little bit. The key to turn him around really would be to get him to switch off.
“After that we went back to 1200m, in a Listed race … and he just got caught on the rail at Eagle Farm which was a no-go zone. He wasn’t beaten far so this Ramornie sets up well for him.
“The barrier (the widest draw in a big field) is not ideal, but we’ll just ride him back in the field with a bit of cover. Ben (Thompson) is in great form and if he can get him on the back of the right horses, he can really finish off.
“He has clearly got the ability for a race of this nature. The Ramornies, the Weetwoods, the Eye Liners … like all of these country sprints you have got to get moving at the right time and you have got have your share of luck to win them.
“He has got a light weight. He has got a jockey in great form and the horse is in great shape, so, If we can get the right luck, he is certainly a good enough horse to win.”
*Worth noting is the fact that Outback Barbie’s unraced half-sister Frosty Mango (Hinchinbrook – Pure Purrfection) won her first trial at Eagle Farm yesterday. As on member of the family prepares to bow out, another is about to appear on the scene.
