Aeliana (outer) gets up to grab Dubai Honour in the Tancred Stakes at Rosehill on Saturday. Photo / Bradley Photos
New Zealand’s world champion jockey James McDonald says now that the Kiwi drought of Group 1 wins in Australia has broken, the nation’s jockeys can double down – or even triple down – across the Tasman in the next fortnight.
McDonald had a front-row seat as Belle Cheval won the Vinery Stakes at Rosehill in Sydney on Saturday, as he was stalking her all the way on joint favourite Ohope Wins.
While Belle Cheval kicked hard at the 200m mark, giving herself the speed wobbles before going on to a nose victory, New Zealand Oaks winner Ohope Wins kept closing to finish fourth in her first start for new trainer Chris Waller.
Belle Cheval’s win was the first at Group 1 level for a New Zealand-trained horse in Australia for two years and McDonald says Ohope Wins can grab another (of a sort) in the ATC Oaks on April 11, even if she is now officially trained in Australia.
“I think she will be better in the Oaks,” McDonald told the Herald.
“She lay out on Saturday and then the tempo was against her,” he says.
“Those two things combined made it really tough for her to make ground and the winner is obviously a good filly, as we have seen back home.
“I think on the bigger track at Randwick and back up to 2400m in the Oaks, Ohope Wins will be better-suited.”
Punters and bookies agree as Ohope Wins is still the $3 favourite for the Oaks on the second day of The Championships, a race Belle Cheval will be allowed to bypass as she heads to the spelling paddock.
Ohope Wins wouldn’t be the first horse to be tripped up by Rosehill’s turning nature but if there is one small concern heading into the Oaks, it could be her busy summer, as she has now had four starts at 2000m or more since New Year’s Day.
Balancing that out is the lack of depth in the Oaks, with Saturday’s narrow runner-up to Belle Cheval, After Summer, the $8 second-favourite in the Oaks.
While the fillies can provide New Zealand with a couple of majors during Sydney racing’s hottest time of the season, the next Group 1 chance for a purely New Zealand-trained horse comes this Saturday when Road To Paris contests the Australian Derby.
The New Zealand Derby winner crosses the Tasman tomorrow and McDonald will again be in the opposing camp, as he rides second-favourite Observer in the Derby.
Road To Paris is rated a $9 chance but is likely to shorten closer to race time, once he has landed in Australia.
And he will also attract plenty of support with tote bettors as the Derby will be a World Pool event, which, being run out of Hong Kong, will see punters attracted to the fact that Zac Purton will ride Road To Paris.
His trainers Roger James and Robert Wellwood go into the Derby in red-hot form, having snared the final Group 1 of the New Zealand season, the Sport Nation Breeders’ Stakes with She’s A Dealer at Trentham on Saturday.
Meanwhile, McDonald was involved in one of the stunning weight-for-age races that captivated punters on both sides of the Tasman on Saturday, when he rode New Zealand-bred Aeliana to down global racing hero Dubai Honour in the Tancred Stakes.
Aeliana looked to be off the bit and beaten at the 300m mark but McDonald let her balance up before launching one final, and ultimately successful, assault on Dubai Honour.
“She is a wonderful mare and had to be so brave to catch Dubai Honour, because he is a proper racehorse,” McDonald said.
“I think the weather could decide whether she goes to the paddock now or has one more run in the Queen Elizabeth.”
The other weight-for-age nail-biter came in the Australia Cup at Flemington, where Light Infantry Man defended his title by just nosing out the wonderful Pride Of Jenni, after the latter looked beaten at the 300m mark but fought doggedly to only go down by a nose.
Those two epics, plus the drama of the Vinery Stakes, made for a great few hours of racing.
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.