Trainer Robert Heathcote has given the all clear for Buffering’s road show to get underway after the multiple Group One winner worked strongly at Eagle Farm.
Buffering, the winner of six Group One races and $6.4 million in prize money, had the honour of becoming the first horse to gallop on the new Eagle Farm course proper.
Ridden by Damian Browne, Buffering worked with stablemate Dream Of Slips, moving off from the 800m and then quickening from the 600m.
When Browne asked Buffering for an effort, he put six lengths on Dream Of Slips who is regarded as one of the better restricted-class horses in Brisbane.
Heathcote said the hit-out had been exactly when Buffering needed in the lead-up to an overseas trip.
“He will not have another serious hit-out until he gets to Dubai,” Heathcote said.
“But he stretched out today on a track which had been soaked overnight.
“Buffering might be eight (years old) but I took heart from the Group Three race in Dubai at the weekend.
“The winner was eight, the third horse was nine and there was a ten-year-old in the field.”
Browne said Buffering felt in tremendous order.
“That was an improvement on his recent hit-outs and he is getting back to his best,” Browne said.
Buffering leaves for Sydney on Thursday and will stay at Warwick Farm until he flies out on Monday for Dubai where he runs in the Al Quoz Sprint (1000m) at the World Cup meeting on March 26.
Heathcote plans to send Buffering to Hong Kong for the Group One Chairman’s Sprint Prize on May 1.
It was Buffering’s second public trackwork session in a week as he galloped with stablemate Gid Up Strop between races at Doomben on Saturday.
That was a soft gallop but Tuesday was far more business-like.
Construction work at Eagle Farm, which has been closed for 20 months, is coming along well for a May 11 reopening.
Pedestrian and motor tunnels underneath the track are complete and much of the grass has been re-laid.
Work has also started on 400 on-course stables, located in the middle of the racecourse.
The $50 million upgrade is part of a billion-dollar overhaul of the Eagle Farm precinct.
