Horse Racing: Hopes high at last event of Ruakaka winter season

Soultaker will be looking for another win after a win at Ellerslie Race Course. PHOTO/TRISH DUNELL

Is this year's Victorian Derby winner starting at Ruakaka tomorrow?

Toorak Tower, a last-start Ruakaka maiden winner is nominated for the VRC Derby on Saturday, October 15, at Flemington so it would be expected that he would be the logical favourite for the last race over 1600m. From the stable of Donna Logan and Chris Gibbs the Toorak Toff gelding was impressive in winning his maiden last start over 1400m. The stable has a number of good-quality 3-year-olds so Toorak Tower must have proven his capability on the track to justify a Derby nomination.

The stable's top 3-year-old could be The Soultaker who proved his ability by winning The Bonecrusher Group 3 race at Ellerslie last Saturday on very heavy track conditions.

The win of The Soultaker, now under offer to Hong Kong interests, is a further endorsement of the quality of the Tavistock Northland Breeder's Stakes.

The event is on the cusp of being upgraded from a Listed Race to a Group 3 classification. The better the future performances of horses like Heroic Valour, The Soultaker and Wyndespelle are, the greater the certainty of the upgrade for the local premium thoroughbred race.

For the first time this Ruakaka winter season there will be nine races with the fields dominated by the local stables.

The Logan/Gibbs team have 20 acceptors and the Rae Racing stable has nine. Regular visitors with big teams are the McKee/Chippendale and Karen Fursdon stables with six runners each.

For the 2015/16 racing season the Logan/Gibbs stable had their lowest number of race starters in New Zealand since the 2007/8 season, with a total number of 278 runners for 39 wins. The previous year, they had 52 winners but the decision to aim for the better-quality races proved successful with a slightly higher $1.25 million in prize money earned by their runners.

The Kenny Rae stable, also based at the Ruakaka racecourse with a satellite stable in Christchurch, won 20 races in 2015/16 from a slightly lower number of runners than last year with 238 runners. It was their best season since 2012/13 when they won 24 races.

The horse that deserves to win tomorrow is the 37-start maiden Affogato in the Northgate Lodge Maiden over 2100m. Trained locally by Rick Wells, the 6-year-old has had five runs on the course this winter, including a third in the much higher-grade rating 85 over 2100m back on June 18. A performance similar to that day would see Affogato an easy winner.