Good horses can scare off their opposition but in the case of unbeaten mare Autumn Glow, she is all but scaring off her own stablemates.
A dominant $1.90 favourite for next Saturday’s Group 1 Epsom Handicap (1600m), Autumn Glow is likely to be one of only “two or three” starters for Chris Waller, who is often heavy-handed in the feature Randwick miles.
While the champion horseman will finalise his Epsom contingent on Monday, he admitted he wasn’t keen for many of his other horses to take on Autumn Glow at Randwick.
“We will work that out on Monday but we will be less than normal,” Waller said.
“I think the top seed is going to be hard to beat.”
Autumn Glow tuned up for her maiden Group 1 assignment with a solo workout between races at Rosehill on Saturday.
With jockey Kerrin Mcevoy in the saddle, she breezed over 1000m in 1:06.92, running home her final 600m in 36.94 seconds.
The mare will be bidding to extend her unbeaten run to seven in the showpiece race after taking out the Toy Show Quality (1100m) and Theo Marks Stakes (1300m) to start her carnival campaign and Waller described her preparation as “perfect”.
“Since her good last start win she has ticked over nicely at home and we thought we’d bring her (to Rosehill) to give her a race day experience, settle the nerves and make sure we were on track for next Saturday,” he said.
Waller will have weight of numbers on his side in the Group 1 Metropolitan (2400m) with the two leading fancies, last start winners Birdman and Soul Of Spain, headlining his squad.
“We’ll be well represented there. Birdman was terrific the other week and he’s very well suited by the handicap,” Waller said.
“Soul Of Spain, who won at Newcastle, he gets in very well also with only a half-kilo penalty.”
Waller also has Etna Rosso, More Felons and Travolta on track for the staying feature while Enviable and Karinska are likely to be his representatives in the afternoon’s other Group 1 race, the Flight Stakes (1600m) for the three-year-old fillies.
