Trainer Robert Heathcote says Nash Rawiller and a kind barrier can help Solzhenitsyn in his bid for another Melbourne Group One win at Caulfield on Sunday.
One of seven elite level winners in the Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes (1400m), Solzhenitsyn returns to the scene of his most important win in the 2012 Toorak Handicap.
Heathcote said the gelding’s first-up run after a 14-week spell where he ran second to Riva de Lago in the Group Two Theo Marks Stakes at Rosehill on September 14 showed he had resumed in great order.
“We are going into the race with an air of confidence that we’re going to run well,” Heathcote said.
“It’s a crack field of quality horses and Solzhenitsyn has 57.5 (kilograms) – that’s a good horse’s weight in anybody’s language.
“But we’ve got barrier five and Nash Rawiller, so we have a couple of things in our favour.”
Solzhenitsyn is on the third line of betting at $8 behind the favourite, the Sydney-trained Rebel Dane ($5) and Strawberry Boy ($6), who has won two of his last three races at metropolitan tracks in open company.
Heathcote is hoping for a dry track for Solzhenitsyn who has won most of his races on good to dead tracks.
He has planned the same spring program as last year for Solzhenitsyn when he ran third behind Moment of Change in the Sir Rupert Clarke.
After Sunday’s race, Heathcote will try to repeat Solzhenitsyn’s Toorak Handicap win, followed by the Crystal Mile on Cox Plate day, wrapping up his campaign with the Group One $1 million Emirates Stakes at Flemington on November 6.
