Race fitness will be the key ingredient Midnight Dynamite takes into his Missile Stakes clash against more highly lauded sprinters Angel Capital and Napoleonic, albeit that advantage will be offset by a distance drop.
One of the form horses of the Sydney winter, Midnight Dynamite posted Listed wins in the Civic Stakes (1400m) and Winter Challenge (1500m), and sandwiched another black-type placing in between.
Trainer Bjorn Baker elected to keep him in work with the option of stepping him up to a mile in Friday’s Coffs Harbour Cup, or freshening him for the Group 2 Missile Stakes (1200m) and settled on the latter.
“We toyed with the idea of running him over a bit further in the Coffs Cup, but just timing-wise and with him being deep into a ‘prep’, we’d rather freshen him and bring him back to the 1200 than go up in trip,” Baker’s racing manager, Luke Hilton, said.
“He’s in great order. The gate is a big advantage now. He can settle in the first half of a field and if he’s sharp enough, I don’t think they’re going to run past him on fitness.”
With the exception of Way To The Stars, who will be second-up, Midnight Dynamite’s remaining rivals are all resuming.
The five-year-old is a winner of his only start over the 1200m Randwick circuit, and Hilton says he is well and bright going into Saturday.
“He’s in a great frame of mind after his last win. We backed right off him for a week, and we’ve built him back up slowly. He looks fantastic,” he said.
“His work on Tuesday was probably as sharp as I’ve seen him this preparation.
“It’s hard to go to a race like that confident, but I’m confident the horse is as good as he can be.”
Midnight Dynamite ($9) headlines a team of five runners for Baker, with Amazing Eagle ($4) considered the stable’s leading chance for a victory in the Ranvet Handicap (1000m). Those comparing the best betting apps Australia will no doubt have a close eye on the market for Baker’s team.
The winner of the 2024 Brian Crowley Stakes (1100m), the five-year-old was purchased as a tried horse by syndicators Darby Racing – as was Midnight Dynamite – and will be chasing his first success for his new ownership group.
Stardeel ($21) is the roughest of Baker’s runners after disappointing in two starts since his impressive first-up win at Rosehill in May.
Hilton said the horse had excuses at his next run but performed below expectations last time and they’d tried a slightly different approach to coax him back to his best.
“We rode him back last start and thought he had a good run in the race, but he didn’t really finish it off. He’s better than that. We’ve seen it,” Hilton said.
“We’ve tried to space his runs a touch more into this race and give him three weeks. Hopefully it might spark something.
“He’s got a good gate where he’ll have no excuses and do no work, so he’s really got to step up to the mark because he has been a head scratcher.”
