Tall Poppy's ability to win fresh up from a spell and her record at 1400m could give her an edge over a high class field in the $100,000 Mudgway Partsworld Stakes at Hastings.
The group two weight-for-age event is the feature race on the first of the three-day Hawkes Bay spring carnival which continues on September 16 and 30.
Tall Poppy is one of four group one winners entered for the race, the others being The Message, Aerosmith and Cent Home. There are also five others in the race that are group one placed - Buster Brookfield, Cheiron, Resonare, Integrate and Cinder Bella.
Between them, the 15 horses in the race have won 115 races and more than $4 million in stake money.
Tall Poppy has won nine races from just 20 starts in New Zealand and five of those have been at 1400m. She has not raced since failing in the Doncaster Handicap (1600m) in Sydney on April 22 but has won twice when fresh up.
The six-year-old showed she is ready to resume when winning a 1000m trial at Waverley last month and following up with some impressive track gallops in the past fortnight.
The Kaapstad mare has drawn ideally at barrier three and should be in or near the lead throughout. She is also a past winner on the Hastings track.
Cent Home is a Hastings track specialist, with four wins, a second and a fifth from his only starts on the track.
He has not race since last October and has never won fresh up in the past. But he did finish second when resuming from a spell over 1400m at Hastings at the beginning of last season and looks to have come up bigger and stronger this season.
Cheiron and Integrate, both of whom campaigned at the recent Brisbane winter carnival, should be more seasoned than most of the others and this could be a big advantage. at the end of what promises to be a hard race.
- NZPA
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