The Annabel Neasham-trained Cadenabbia has notched up his second win in trying conditions at Warwick Farm on Wednesday.
It was just his second start under the Annabel Neasham banner, after being transferred to the young trainer from Chris Waller.
The three-year-old colt has been tried in black type company, but finished a distant ninth in the Gloaming Stakes (1800m) last year.
Neasham said the three-year-old has always shown ability despite an up-and-down campaign.
“He’s a beautiful son of Redoute’s (Choice) that has always shown a bit at home,” she said.
“It’s just been a frustrating preparation, last start at Newcastle seems a long time ago, but the team have done a great job getting him here in good shape.
“He was a little bit soft coming into today, so he’ll take nice improvement and I think he’s a nice horse to go through the grades.”
Cadenabbia jumped from the inside barrier and was able to take up a position on the back of the leading horse.
Tommy Berry stuck to the inside on the colt, which appeared to be the inferior ground on the heavy eight rated surface and dug deep over the last 100m.
The three-year-old was in a ding-dong battle with the Waller-trained Fastconi right to the finish line but proved too strong to win by 0.2 lengths.
Berry said the colt’s confidence levels have risen, but he still has plenty of improvement in him.
“I think he gained a lot of confidence out of his trial win the other day. He got into a nice rhythm with me, and he quickened up very well,” he said.
“I said to Annabel ‘if he can bring that to the races today, he’ll be hard to beat’. I was happy to take a sit with him if he could and he relaxed well and showed a good turn of foot.
“He’s still getting a bit lost, but when Brenton (Avdulla) come up to him on Fastconi, he found again.
“He’s still a big baby. I know he was pretty dominant today, but I feel like he’s still more there. He feels like there’s another gear there that he’s holding back with.
“I reckon he can make it to Saturday grade without a problem.”
