Alta Meteor won’t light up Addington as road to NZ Cup gets serious

Republican Party won the Auckland Cup last December but won't be rushed back to the track this spring. Photo / HRNZ

One of the potential pacing stars of the early spring has been forced out of Friday night’s Allied Security Maurice Holmes Vase at Addington.

Alta Meteor would have been perfectly placed in the Group 3 after thrashing many of his race rivals off a 30m handicap when returning to racing at Addington 12 days ago.

But co-trainer Steve Telfer said a minor issue will keep Alta Meteor from taking his place in this Friday’s automatic qualifier for the IRT New Zealand Cup, the first serious step to the great race.

“He came through that win well but a few days later he picked up a bug,” Telfer said.

“It was nothing too serious but he needed antibiotics and missed a bit of work.

“We could have pushed him to get him ready for this week but we didn’t need to.

“So he will head to the races in two weeks instead. That is the beauty of having him up and running early, this won’t affect his New Zealand Cup preparation at all.”

The Maurice Holmes is set to involve those who finished behind Alta Meteor last start, including Franco Marek, American Me and Mo’unga, returning for another crack this Friday, while an interesting open class newcomer in the nominations is Bazooka for trainer Steven Reid.

Alexandra Park will also host a quasi-open class pace this Friday with Akuta returning for the second start of his comeback. He will only face four opponents but there is depth to the 1700m mobile event.

Meanwhile, New Zealand’s best-performed pacer of 2025 is going to keep punters waiting longer than expected for her return.

Republican Party may not be back on the racetrack until October after co-trainer Cran Dalgety announced the plan on Monday. He said the Auckland Cup and multiple Group 1 winner is on a three-race preparation for the $1 million IRT New Zealand Cup on November 11.

“He has come up great and looks fantastic,” Dalgety said.

“But he is still about three weeks away from trialling.

“We are looking at starting back at the races in early October and then heading to the Flying Stakes at Ashburton.

“We can then probably have one more run before the Cup and then it is all on.”


Dalgety said the slightly later return has come about for two reasons.

“The open class season for these really top horses is so busy these days, once they are up and running there really is no break.

“Once he goes to the Cup he can head to the Free-For-All, Invercargill Cup, Auckland Cup and then there are a whole lot of big races in Victoria before the Miracle Mile carnival.

“Then it is back here for the Race by Betcha at Cambridge in April and the Alexandra Park races.

“I am not saying he will head to all those races but he has the option to so we’d rather not go too early.”

Dalgety said he and wife Chrissie have the luxury of a three-race prep for the New Zealand Cup because Republican Party is now an open class veteran.

“He doesn’t need to learn or adapt to it any more. He knows what it is all about so he can slide straight back into it.

“But it is very exciting the options a horse like him has these days.”

The Dalgetys were also stoked to win the first New Zealand harness race for the TAB Racing Club at Addington last Friday when Eun Sogno won on debut.

Eun Sogno roughly translates to “a dream” in Italian, with the juvenile a son of former great filly One Dream.

“We were surprised not because we didn’t think he had the ability but because there were a couple of really nice horses in there we thought might be more advanced.

“So to beat them the way he did with some pretty fast closing sectionals suggests he has a bright future.”

Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s Racing Editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.