NZ racing wrap: Baster to pilot Jon Snow in Memsie Stakes
GROUP one winner Jon Snow will be ridden by Stephen Baster in Saturday’s $1 million Memsie Stakes at Caulfield
Last season’s Group One Australian Derby winner will be the first of Murray Baker and Andrew Forsman’s quartet of Melbourne spring carnival contenders to step out.
“Over 1400 metres in that class of field might be a bit sharp for him, but he travelled over well and galloped strongly under Baster this morning,” Forsman said.
Jon Snow was accompanied to Australia by fellow Group One winners Bonneval and Lizzie L’Amour, which will resume in the Group One Dato Chin Nam Stakes at Moonee Valley on Saturday week.
The three-year-old Weather With You is likely to run at Sandown next week to open his Group One VRC Derby campaign.
“At this stage he’ll run in a three-year-old 1400m maiden,” Forsman said.
First Australian winner for Reliable Man
Westbury Stud resident Reliable Man, a Group One winner in both hemispheres, has opened its stallion account in Australia.
Expatriate New Zealand trainers Trent Busuttin and Natalie Young produced his promising son Sully to win over 1400m at Wangaratta on Monday.
Nominated for the Group One Caulfield Guineas, Sully had placed at his previous two starts including a third behind the boom colt Royal Symphony at Flemington in June.
Hastings preferred port of call for Animator
Brendon Hawtin is keen on a return trip to Hawke’s Bay this Saturday with Animator.
The Cambridge trainer has the Encosta De Lago gelding in Wednesday’s Clothier Family 1400 at Matamata, but his preference is to wait for the weekend.
“I’ve nominated him for Hastings and hope he gets in,” Hawtin said.
“He really likes it down there.”
Animator is a two-time winner on the course and was successful there at its last start in July.
“We gave him two weeks out after that and he’s done well,” Hawtin said. “We don’t do a lot of fast work with him and do a fait bit of jumping with him, he loves that caper.”
New look for Perfect Fit
The connections of Perfect Fit are hoping a gear addition at Hastings will bring out the best in the horse in Saturday’s Group One Tarzino Trophy.
Trainers Ken and Bev Kelso have decided to put the blinkers on the mare in the wake of her unplaced run in the Group Two Foxbridge Plate.
“It was Bev’s suggestion, the same as it was when Xanadu beat Mufhasa in the Windsor Park Plate, so I’m happy to run with it,” Ken Kelso told The Informant.
“We’ve been happy with her all the way through, but we feel that by adding blinkers it will just sharpen her.”