Joe Pride is in no hurry to curb the race day behaviour of promising sprinter Rain Affair.
And with four impressive wins from just five starts it’s easy to understand why.
Rain Affair, who resumes from a let-up at Rosehill on Saturday, gets excitable and has needed the attention of both his strapper and Pride in the parade ring but the trainer believes that’s part of what makes the three-year-old the horse he is.
“He’s a real handful,” Pride said.
“He’s a lot better at home but at the races he’s all business. When I say all business, he’s not professional about it but he just wants to get on with it and that’s just him.
“That bit of mongrel kind of makes him all right I think.
“He’s like that when he races, it’s just catch me if you can tactics and he’s gutsy.
“I’m not sure we want to get it out of him completely but it would be nice to think we could tame his manners to a degree.”
Pride deliberately sent Rain Affair for a short let-up after he made light work of his first Saturday city assignment with a runaway win at Canterbury on May 7.
The son of Commands is $1.55 favourite for Saturday’s Harris Farm Handicap (1100m) and Pride is keen for Rain Affair to cash in before he turns four at the end of the month.
“There is still another month to go this season and I want to get another BOBS win or two with him,” Pride said.
“I know that doesn’t sound too ambitious with a horse like this but I think it’s all important and if you win a BOBS bonus race on a Saturday it’s like winning a Listed race in terms of prizemoney.
“We’ll try and squeeze a couple more out of him if we can and then maybe look a something early in the carnival like the Starlight Stakes.”
The Listed Starlight Stakes (1100m) is run at Rosehill on August 13 and Pride plans for Rain Affair to take a fitness edge into that event against more seasoned campaigners.
“He’s a horse with plenty of promise. I’m going to keep lifting the bar and he needs to keep meeting it. Hopefully he can,” Pride said.
AAP TURF
