Trainer Ben Currie will have his biggest ever representation at a metropolitan meeting but it is one of his first starters which has caught the most early attention.
Currie trained his 108th Queensland winner and his 110th in Australia when Mishani Electra won the last race at Ipswich on Wednesday.
He accepted with 21 runners at the feature Toowoomba meeting on Saturday but is likely to have 17 or 18 after scratchings.
Currie has favoured runners in many of the races but first starter Cuddle Me Tight is the short-priced favourite in the 2YO Handicap (1100m).
Cuddle Me Tight is by Love Conquers All out of So Cuddly who was a Sydney winner.
The filly has not had an official trial but was the $1.60 favourite on race eve.
Currie will play a major hand in the feature races including Honey Toast in the Toowoomba Cup.
Honey Toast won the race in 2016, giving the young trainer’s stable a boost but Currie has taken a long time to get the gelding right after he missed last season with a tendon injury.
“He has had three runs back from a spell and his last-start second at Doomben was great. They will want to be good to beat him,” Currie said.
“Honey Toast has put in a long fitness process and it is starting to show.”,
Currie has three confirmed runners and two emergencies in the Listed Weetwood Hcp (1200m), the race which he won last year when Col ‘N’ Lil dead-heated with Jumbo Prince.
Currie has Amanaat, who has won six of his past seven starts, and also former Lindsay Park galloper Ruettiger and handy mare With A Promise in the field.
“Amanaat is a speed horse but he lifts the bar every time he goes around,” Currie said.
“Ruettiger is the tough older horse who is the type you like to have in a real fight in the Weetwood.”
