The Godolphin blue has its sights set on the $1 million TBV VOBIS Platinum Showdown this Saturday, as well as future editions of the race, with three contenders ready to compete this weekend.
Fresh from claiming the $2.5 million All-Star Mile last weekend, the team is looking for more feature-race success in Melbourne with three sons of their stallion Frosted—Cloisters, Chergui, and Cryoseisms—who all worked at Caulfield on Tuesday morning in preparation for the race.
“We try to target this race now as we are quite lucky to have the facilities in Melbourne and we breed horses in Victoria, so it’s a great initiative for breeders having horses bred in Victoria to run for such good prizemoney,” said Godolphin’s Melbourne foreman Nacim Dilmi.
“We will be targeting the race I’d say from now on every year.”
The winner of the race will take home $550,000, plus additional VOBIS bonuses.
While Cloisters will need to overturn a previous defeat to pre-race favorite McGaw, an impressive Bendigo win and a strong jumpout since have boosted the stable’s confidence that he will improve for his fourth start.
“He is quite deceiving because at home he will only do what he’s asked to do,” Dilmi explained.
“That’s how Jamie (Melham) described him in his jumpout last Friday—he is quiet and unassuming, but once asked to quicken, he really gets his mind on the job and does things quite easily.”
“He was tough at Bendigo when he broke his maiden and was nearly going to be beaten.”
Cloisters worked alongside Cryoseisms, a son of Blue Diamond winner Earthquake, who has returned from two starts in New South Wales.
The third stable runner, Chergui, will also line up in the race.
“Whether it was the first time up the straight … we didn’t expect him to race the way he raced,” Dilmi said of Chergui’s fourth-place finish at Flemington last start.
“He has pulled up great and we’re very happy with his gallop this morning.”
