The Good, The Bad and The Ugly – August 8th Edition

Spring was in the air at both Rosehill and Flemington on Saturday, while earlier in the week, the best sprinter in the world had his first public hitout in readiness for The Everest. All that and more in this weeks edition of ‘The Good, The Bad and The Ugly’.

KEY NEWS:

Everest Calling For Eduardo?

That’s what Joe Pride is hoping for after Eduardo made it 2/2 for the stable when winning the Missile Stakes (1200m) on Saturday, leading throughout under Nash Rawiller, who copped a suspension for his winning wide and will be out of action until September 1. With Pride putting the call out to The Everest slot holders, he’s now into $26 from $101.

Godolphin Sprinter Brave In Aurie’s Star

James Cummings made the somewhat surprising call that Home Of The Brave was the best straight track horse he had trained and the horse lived up to that call with a win on Saturday in the Aurie’s Star, wearing down a very game Great Again in a race that I doubt will produce strong Spring Carnival form lines outside Game Keeper, but the Godolphin galloper continued his love affair with the course.

Nature Strip Dazzles In Trial

It’s to be expected, but it was still great to watch seeing Nature Strip doing his thing in a trial earlier this week at Rosehill, looking to relax sweetly on speed and drawing clear late to win under his own steam. Not surprisingly, he firmed in markets for The Everest and is as short as $3 for the feature of the Sydney Spring.

PERFORMANCE OF THE WEEK:

Heading across the ditch to Hawera this afternoon and Hazel Schofer, a young apprentice who ride six winners this afternoon, all rides being rippers too. Not easy for an apprentice to ride one in town, never mind two or more. But six winners is an outstanding. The most impressive was a mare who will feature down below.

DEBUT OF THE WEEK:

It’s the old warning signal of a flashy win on a Synthetic track, but gee it was hard not to be impressed by the win of Jenni’s Rainbow at Pakenham on Tuesday. She went from a few lengths off them with 300m to go winning by three lengths with something in hand and ran some of the best late splits of the meeting. If she can translate that to turf, stable will have plenty of fun.

RIDE OF THE WEEK:

I’ve given him some crap in the past, but credit where credit is due, it was a lovely ride from Liam Riordan aboard Coming Around at Flemington. Made sure he held the box seat but the part I liked is that the run on the fence was there to be had. But Riordan wanted none of that given nothing on the fence had won, so he shoved into clear air out wider and the horse did the rest.

SLAUGHTER OF THE WEEK:

Sometimes you just have to laugh at what goes on with racing in Queensland. $1.65 favourite in the fourth at Doomben today, Reus, heavily backed, draws gate two…yet ends up three wide for the last half of the race. I have no idea what Robbie Fradd was thinking but he gave that horse absolutely zero.

HORSES TO FOLLOW:

Aricina – She’s the one from Hawera. Allan Sharrock rates her highly and she’s destined for blacktype success
Montefelia – She can keep on winning. Oaks contender for sure
Anders – If he can keep finding wet tracks, he’ll be competitive in whatever he contests
Fender – Legitimate Kosciuszko horse
Game Keeper – Sneaky Rupert Clarke/Toorak type maybe. Lovely return
Octane – He can win a nice race in Melbourne

ONE MORE CHANCE:

Melody Belle – Not sacking her off that
South Pacific – Race shape totally against him

NEVER EVER AGAIN:

Austria – Bit like me at my Year 12 Formal. Promises plenty early but delivers nothing when it matters
Loveseat – This is her level and I think she’s had enough
Lucky For All – First up off a long break…but that was ugly
Dogmatic – Becoming too costly