David Pfieffer knows what it takes to win feature races in Queensland.
Two years ago Graceful Anna significantly boosted Pfieffer’s profile when she won the Magic Millions Trophy for three-year-olds after winning the Vo Rogue Plate at Doomben.
Graceful Anna’s success was followed a year later by Gai’s Choice who won the Magic Millions Fillies and Mares Quality for the Warwick Farm trainer.
Gai’s Choice is back in Brisbane chasing another feature race win for Pfieffer in Saturday’s Travel Associates Classic (1200m) at Eagle Farm.
Pfieffer is keen to again target the Magic Millions carnival in January with Gai’s Choice but hasn’t decided which race the mare will contest.
“At the moment I’m tossing up between having another crack at winning the Fillies and Mares over 1300 metres or running in the Cup over 1400 metres which is worth twice as much prize money,” he said.
“I’ll be guided by how she goes in this race on Saturday and the Just Now Quality at Eagle Farm in a couple of weeks.”
At this year’s winter carnival Gai’s Choice was in career-best form winning the Gai Waterhouse Classic at Ipswich before finishing third to Pear Tart in the Group One Tatt’s Tiara.
“Everything went right during that campaign,” he said.
“She went from winning a Benchmark 80 first-up to running third in a Group One in the space of six weeks.”
Her form this campaign looks uninspiring but Pfieffer says the raw data doesn’t accurately reflect how well the mare is performing.
“Although she didn’t have a very successful campaign in Melbourne she didn’t have a lot of luck at her last start at Flemington on Cup day when she never really got a crack at them in the straight,” Pfieffer said.
“She didn’t show any signs of tiredness after she came back from Melbourne so I decided to give her a trial and I thought she did enough in that hitout to warrant heading to Brisbane.”
Meanwhile, Desleigh Forster believes Poste Restante can maintain her outstanding form this campaign when she steps up to 2118m against open company on Saturday.
“A few of the horses she’s up against have probably reached their mark whereas this mare is the new kid on the block,” she said
