Vegas Queen returns in a small but competitive open 1200m set to be run on a decent May surface, which should suit the high-class speedster.
Vegas Queen is already the winner of the Group 2 Wellington Guineas and returned to racing at Ellerslie in November by beating our undoubted Sprinter of the Year in First Five, so she has genuine class for a mare returning to racing at this stage of the season.
She is one of two high-class mares Rae has returning to the races on the same day, with stablemate Illicit Dreams also fresh up in the open 1200m at today’s other domestic meeting at Riccarton.
“I am really happy with both [of] them, but the thing that stops me being 100% confident is they haven’t trialled,” Rae told the Herald.
“I entered them for the trials but they got eliminated from a start, which I don’t understand, and you are always more confident at this level when you have seen them trial.
“But we galloped them together at home [Ruakaka] last week and they both galloped really well, with their last 600m in under 34 seconds, so they must be pretty close to right.”
So who won that private workout?
“Vegas Queen did because she is the better of them. She is very good, whereas Illicit Dream is good.”
Vegas Queen didn’t show her best when asked to step up to first 1600m and then 1500m at the back end of summer, but she is a naturally fast mare who will take catching if she can sit handy and launch at the top of the Te Rapa straight today.
It is a tidy field, though, with plenty of black-type performers. Force Of Nature (R4, No 2) has a superb Te Rapa record, Moschino has been consistently good this summer, and a logical case could be made for any of the eight starters.
“And the other mare [Illicit Dreams] has to be a chance down south too now that one of the favourites is scratched,” adds Rae.
The Te Rapa sprint rivals the $80,000 Waikato Equine Veterinary Centre Stakes as the highlight of today’s meeting, as again there is a case to be made for almost all nine starters having at least a place chance.
Excite (R5, No 1) might have the best Group 1 form, but he is still a maiden in a race containing five rivals who are not and how the Te Rapa track plays after racing there just last Saturday could be crucial
The rail has been moved out 3m for today and not too many runners came wide in the straight last Saturday, so the inside should provide relatively even footing in the home straight.
But most times a track races two Saturdays in a row you can expect horses to start to fan wider seeking fresher ground later in the meeting.
Today’s racing on both sides of the Tasman is almost a chance for punters to catch their collective breath after what has felt like an endless weekly string of major meetings.
The key Kiwi interest across the Tasman is talented 3-year-old Geneva in the A$1 million South Australian Derby at Morphettville
The Kylie Hoskin-trained gelding was a luckless third in a dramatic New Zealand Derby two months ago and has bolted away with the Manawatu Classic since, so while he is rated a $26 chance today, he is capable of upsetting in a true stayers test over 2500m.
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.
