A gallop on the Port Fairy beach on Wednesday will decide if Raffaello resumes for his new trainer Patrick Ryan in Saturday’s Straight Six at Flemington.
Ryan said he had earmarked the Listed 1200m sprint to kick off Raffaello’s campaign but he warned that the horse would be underdone due to a lack of fast gallops.
“He’s done a lot of three-quarter and evens work but no let-down gallops so he’s going to go in with only one solid gallop under his belt,” the Warrnambool trainer said.
“But it might be the last dead four or dead five track that we get for a while and he’s a duffer in the wet.”
The six-year-old entire, by Encosta de Lago, was picked up by Ryan for stable clients at a sale for $85,000.
Formerly trained by his owner Jim Marconi, Raffaello also had a stint with Mark Kavanagh and has won nine races and been placed another eight times from 44 starts for $531,435 in prize money.
With Kavanagh, Raffaello was third to Turffontein in the 2009 Group One Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes (1400m) at Caulfield, while back with Marconi he was runner-up behind Triple Honour in the Group Two Eagle Farm Cup (2200m) only two starts back in June last year.
The horse hasn’t raced since finishing 13th to Response in the Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes last spring.
“He’s a lovely horse. He’s the best-actioned animal I’ve ever sat on,” he said.
“Just a beautifully balanced, economical and fluent action.
“We’re going to look at some races in the spring even if they turn out to be the lesser ones, but we want to give him one or two runs over the winter so that he doesn’t get too rusty.”
Ryan said he would look at running Raffaello in one of the heats of the Winter Championship Series if he could get a reasonable track surface.
There were 21 entries for the Straight Six including dual Group One winner Yosei who’ll be ridden by Mark Zahra on Saturday.
The filly’s regular rider Michelle Payne is sidelined due to suffering a fracture to the C2 vertebra in her neck in a race fall at Caulfield on February 12.
Payne is close to resuming riding trackwork.
Ryan’s other Flemington entry is last-start Warrnambool placegetter Rejuvenated in the $200,000 Listed Andrew Ramsden Stakes (3200m) which has 23 entries including Capecover, Niwot and Rusticated who is after a fourth straight win.
AAP TURF
