The experience trainer Steve Farley gained on his first assault on the Melbourne spring carnival was put to immediate use the second time around when his stable star Sincero announced himself as a genuine big-race contender at Caulfield on Saturday.
“I came here last year thinking we were a chance in the best races, but I got a few things wrong,” Farley said.
Sincero winning the New Zealand Bloodstock Memsie Stakes at Caulfield - photo by Race Horse Photos Australia
“At the same time, I think I learned a lot.”
Sincero’s winning performance in the Group Two Memsie Stakes (1400m) suggests his trainer is correct.
Against a field made up of a mixture of fit, in-form gallopers and aspirants for greater spring glories, Sincero served notice that his Cox Plate hopes are more than realistic.
Sent out favourite, Sincero ($3.60) produced a dazzling turn of foot over the final 250m to demolish the Memsie field, scoring by two lengths from Happy Trails ($13).
Second Effort ($19), himself an impressive Group Two winner at his previous start, finished third, 1-1/4 lengths further back.
The style in which Sincero put the opposition away prompted Farley to declare him “the most underrated horse in Australia”.
That situation, however, seems likely to be short-lived.
“He’s got a turn of foot you can’t believe,” Farley said.
“When he lets go he doesn’t really quicken though, he lengthens.”
As he did a year ago, Farley has set Sincero for the Cox Plate, but this time he believes he knows a lot more about how to win it.
Sincero raced three times in Melbourne last spring, finishing fifth in the Caulfield Stakes, ninth in the Cox Plate and seventh in the Mackinnon Stakes.
This spring the campaign that began on Saturday continues in the Group One Underwood Stakes (1800m) at the same track on September 22 followed by the Group One Caulfield Stakes (2000m) three weeks later and the Group One Cox Plate (2040m) two weeks after that.
Unfortunately for Sincero’s regular jockey Chris O’Brien, one of the lessons Farley learned a year ago was that big races call for big-race jockeys.
“Chris and I are still great mates, but I think the horse has gone past him,” Farley said.
As a result O’Brien has been replaced by Michael Rodd for Sincero’s spring campaign.
In a race that kicked off several Cups campaigns, encouraging efforts came from Green Moon who was the only horse to make ground and the Italian import Voila Ici who showed surprising pace and then battled on well for sixth.
