Bush trainer Neville Layt will head to Canterbury on Saturday with a filly he was never meant to train.
No When To Hold Em will take her place in the TAB More Than Just Winning Plate (1100m) after earning a trip to town with her fourth on debut in a maiden at Queanbeyan.
The filly is owned by Graham Kelly who raced her dam Cash For Cards, a city winner for Layt as a two-year-old.
Kelly planned to put No When To Hold Em through the sales ring as a yearling but his decision to go to a Goulburn race meeting a year earlier was to change the course of the filly’s future.
Layt was at Goulburn on the same afternoon and won a race which included a service fee to the stallion Lucas Cranach along with the winner’s cheque.
“I walked past Graham who was sitting there at Goulburn and I said, `here, you can use this’,” Layt said.
Graham did. He mated Cash For Cards with Lucas Cranach and the result was a filly foal who he planned to race.
Three months later the foal broke its shoulder and was euthanased, prompting Kelly to rethink his sales plans for its older half-sister, No When To Hold Em.
“We lost the foal in the storm so Graham decided not to send this one to the sales and we’re racing her together,” Layt said.
No When To Hold Em took on older maidens at her debut and after a tardy start she was forced to make a wide run and hit the line late to finish fourth.
Layt says that race experience will be invaluable when she takes on eight city rivals, six of them first starters.
The trainer came to Sydney with another two-year-old filly five years ago and Karuta Queen won a brace of races at Rosehill before going on to win the Magic Millions Classic three months later.
Layt says No When To Hold Em is a different style of filly to Karuta Queen but talented in her own right.
“She’s a long, rangy filly. She looks more like a three-year-old than a two-year-old whereas Karuta Queen was a little block,” Layt said.
