First Five’s Australian raid put on hold as Greene eyes spring return

Plans have been shelved for the moment with regard to First Five taking up the challenge of competing in Australia at this time.

First Five, an eight-time winning son of Almanzor, completed a significant hat trick of wins in New Zealand over the summer, taking out the Group 3 J Swap Sprint over 1400m, before hitting the high note with back-to-back wins at the elite level when taking out the Group 1 Telegraph over 1400m at Trentham and the BCD Group Sprint over 1200m at his home track at Te Rapa.

With First Five very much on an upward trajectory, some feature race challenges in Australia came onto the radar but trainer David Greene, who landed his first Group 1 win when First Five saluted in the Telegraph, readjusted his sights, opting to send First Five to the paddock instead and play the long game in terms of managing the gelding’s career.

That decision was backed by sound logic.

“We weighed up a couple of options in Australia but decided on the spelling paddock instead,” said Greene talking to NZ Herald and LOVERACING NZ.

“There is not really much else left for him unless he is crossing the ditch, which is a difficult thing to do at this late stage of the prep. There is no reason why that isn’t something he can do in the spring.”

“We want to make sure if we take him across there, he is at the top of his game, not at the end of a prep,”

He is still lightly raced and we are looking forward to the next couple of seasons, so we are happy to wait.”