We Walk By Faith is a former Taylor Mile winner facing a tough draw in the Messenger at Alexandra Park tonight. Photo / Ajay Berry
WHO CAN SAVE THE BOOKIES?
The TAB bookies got taken to the cleaners when the favourites won all four Group 1s at Alexandra Park last Friday, so they will be hoping at least one of the hot pots will get beaten tonight, to derail multi-punters.
Here is a look at their best chance of getting a favourite beaten.
Race 4, 6.19pm: Duke Or Bourbon (7) is favourite and the best horse but his $1.35 is too short for any juvenile trotters, and both Royal Monarch (2) and Apollo Eleven (1) could win without shocking.
Race 6, 7.24pm: It’s hard to see how Kyvalley Ray (4) won’t trot to the lead and win, with Petite Amour (1), Kawatiri Trev (7) and Who’s Ya Daddy (6) the dangers.
Race 7, 7.52pm: Secret Wish (1) may be the best filly and have options but there are real threats in Cath (7), Indulge Me (9) and Ripples (10), as well as some early tactical threats. This is a harder race than it looks.
Race 8, 8.22pm: The favourite is Mr Love (7) but he has only won 12 of 46 races, so his $2.80 price is too short. Meant To Be (10) is at least as good a chance, while there are three or four other winning hopes in a weak Rowe Cup.
Race 9, 8.57pm: There are only three winning hopes, with Got The Chocolates (2) rightly the favourite after his performances the past two Fridays. But with Swayzee (1) set to love the 2700m and The Lazarus Effect (5) fast at both ends of a race, this will be tactical.
Hayden Cullen faces three very different scenarios in a treble of the Group 1 races at Alexandra Park tonight.
He and his wife Amanda can win one, can’t win another and look certain to win the first one but won’t get any credit for it.
The Canterbury couple have favourite Secret Wish in the $200,000 Magness Benrow Sires’ Stakes, in which she has the best draw of the favourites and the speed to use it.
They also have one of the “big four” in the $100,000 Dawson Harford Messenger in We Walk By Faith, but he has copped barrier 8, while the favourites Swayzee (1), Got The Chocolates (2) and The Lazarus Effect (5) look set to be race 1-2-3 on the marker pegs.
And then there is Kyvalley Ray, who the Cullens have been caretaker trainers of for six months but who is still officially trained in Victoria by expat Brent Lilley, who just happens to be Cullen’s brother-in-law.
“Lill was over last Friday for his Sires’ Final win and I waited around for my sling after the race but nothing happened,” Cullen says with a laugh.
“He actually goes back to Brent’s stable on Sunday and it has been great to have him here because he is a really good young trotter.”
While tonight’s Breckon Farms Trotting Derby has some promising newcomers, including Kawatiri Trev, it will be a surprise if Kyvalley Ray doesn’t lead and win.
Secret Wish won’t have things quite so easy, even from barrier 1 in the three-year-old fillies race, a week after she galloped when trapped three wide when attacking in the Northern Oaks.
Cath, who won that Oaks, is back as is Indulge Me, who was huge after being checked by Secret Wish and is drawn to follow out at the start, so if Secret Wish’s driver Blair Orange chooses to stay in front, he could give one of his key rivals the perfect trail.
Add in Ripples and the gate speed of Queen Lizzy, who was excellent in the Oaks last Friday, and the race has a few moving parts.
“But I think she has to stay in front,” says Cullen of Secret Wish.
“Last week was just one of those things but I am sure on Friday, up against the markers, the track won’t be an issue.
“She is a really good filly and she took no harm from last Friday so we think she will bounce back.”
As for We Walk By Faith, he may be a former Taylor Mile winner but Cullen is realistic about his chances tonight from the outside draw.
“It is not ideal,” he says.
“It might mean we have to work forward at some stage and if he does, I hope one of the other favourites comes off the markers and gives him a trail.
“But he had to sit parked last Friday, which has never really been his go, and I thought to hold on for fourth was one of the best runs of his career.
“But with the other three favourites drawn where they are he is up against it no matter how well he goes.”
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.