It will be all hands on deck for staff at Lindsay Park at the Blue Diamond Stakes meeting
It will be all hands on deck for staff at Lindsay Park when they saddle 20 runners at the Blue Diamond Stakes meeting at Caulfield.
Those 20 runners are spread across eight of the nine races on Saturday with the stable represented by 11 runners in the three Group One races, the Blue Diamond, the Futurity Stakes and Oakleigh Plate.
Lindsay Park is enjoying its best season from its country base at Euroa and the family partnership of David and Ben Hayes and Tom Dabernig sits second on the metropolitan trainers’ premiership with 69 winners.
However their Group One tally stands at just one with He’s Our Rokkii taking out the Toorak Handicap last spring.
With six runners in the Blue Diamond, two in the Futurity Stakes and three in the Oakleigh Plate, the stable is hopeful of adding to the tally on Saturday.
Senior trainer David Hayes hopes their Oakleigh Plate runners, Sheidel, Miss Promiscuity and Faatinah, will be a force in the 1100m handicap sprint.
Hayes said Sheidel, to be ridden by champion Hong Kong jockey Joao Moreira, was a terrific mare who had been beaten twice in photo finishes in Group One races.
“If she had a four inch bigger nose she would have been a last start Group One winner,” Hayes said.
“Her training has been terrific and from the gate she’ll get a good run.”
Miss Promiscuity hasn’t raced since November after being scratched at the barrier at Caulfield on February 4.
Ideally Hayes said he would liked to have given the mare a run before Saturday’s race.
“She had a slight hoof problem which we’ve corrected and her work has been good,” Hayes said.
“She normally gets better into a preparation as she’s a big gross mare.”
Hayes said Faatinah seemed to have taken no ill-effects from his barrier mishap at Flemington last Saturday when scratched from the Lightning Stakes after being boxed next to The Quarterback who flipped over in the gates.
He’s expecting a much better performance than his last start at Caulfield when seventh in the W J Adams Stakes on February 4.
“We gave him a really good chance in the Lightning at big odds last week,” Hayes said.
“He got scratched at the gates and touch wood there’s been no problems with him.
“He’s got blinkers on for the first time and he might be a big surprise packet in the race.”
