Caulfield track manager Jason Kerr admits he was disappointed and surprised by the way the track played on Blue Diamond Stakes day.
Kerr says he will not be reinventing the wheel when he prepares the surface for its next major meeting featuring the $5 million All-Star Mile in three weeks.
The one difference will be the rail position from three metres out to six metres.
The track for Saturday’s meeting was a talking point after appearing to favour horses close to the fence and on the pace.
“I certainly went into the day thinking the track was in really good order after the rain we’d had on the Tuesday and Wednesday,” Kerr told RSN927 .
“We didn’t require any irrigation leading into the meeting and pretty much the last thing we did to the track was on the Tuesday when we gave it a cut.
“Then the rain came and it just slowly improved. Once the rain stopped on the Wednesday it improved into the Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
“I was pretty happy where it sat on Saturday morning but obviously it didn’t pan out that way.”
Kerr said he decided last Monday to put the rail out from the true position to three metres to eliminate most of the wear from the Orr Stakes meeting two weeks earlier.
“With the sport that we are, you do have days where there are reasons for track bias. Whether that be wind or wear on a rail move that hasn’t quite recovered from the previous meeting but none of those were significant on the day,” he said.
“But certainly three or four of those may have had minor contributions and it’s just added up on the day.
“That’s really the only thing we can come up with. Up and down the track yesterday and this morning and certainly there’s nothing even now that stands out that indicates why it raced like it did.
“We’ll move the rail out to six metres for the All-Star Mile meeting and prep it up as we normally do and certainly have the fingers crossed.
“But Caulfield in the 10 years that I’ve been here, it’s probably played that way probably a handful of times. It’s just unfortunate that was the case on Saturday.
“We certainly won’t be reinventing the wheel as far as preparation goes leading into All-Star Mile.”
