Alabama Lass will return to defend the King's Plate title she won last year. Photo / Kenton Wright
While the appearance of one of galloping’s glamour girls at Champion Day next week still hangs in the balance, another has booked her ticket to Ellerslie with a trial win at Taupō.
The talk of the New Zealand racing weekend was Oaks winner Ohope Wins and co-trainer Lance O’Sullivan says her connections are no closer to a final decision on whether she backs up in the New Zealand Derby on March 7.
With the wonderful filly the $1.70 favourite for the classic back at Ellerslie, betting on the Derby is in a holding pattern until Ohope Wins’ plans are clarified.
But she isn’t the only big name who has punters playing “will they, won’t they” in the countdown to our richest race meeting in 12 days.
Several spots in the $4 million NZB Kiwi still remains to be determined, with Panther the latest confirmed starter.
“He will be taking our Wexford slot,” O’Sullivan said after Panther finished second to Belle Cheval in the Uncle Remus Stakes on Saturday.
He joins War Princess, who was signed up by slot leaser Milan Park yesterday, to bring the NZB Kiwi signings to 10 horses, headlined by $1.20 shot Well Written.
O’Sullivan says while Ohope Wins’ Derby participation is uncertain, he and training partner Andrew Scott will have both Genki (third in the Avondale Guineas) and Yamato Satona, who was eighth in that race, in the Derby.
“And Waitak will be going back up for the Bonecrusher, even though I thought he was pretty average by his standards on Saturday,” O’Sullivan said.
“When he was winning those Group 1s back in the spring, we were popping him over a few tyres [jumping] to keep his mind fresh so we will go back to varying things a bit like that.”
While plenty of other trainers have some thinking of their own to do before deciding who gets a ticket to Champions Day, Alabama Lass left co-trainer Ken Kelso smiling after a stylish trial at Taupō yesterday.
The speed-freak mare led throughout to win the 1100m catchweight trial in the hands of Samantha Collett and will return to defend the $250,000 Kings Plate title she won on Champions Day last year.
Kelso was left flummoxed by Alabama Lass’s mediocre seventh in the Sistema Railway on January 24 so took off the tie tongue he thinks may have been irritating her.
“We have gone back to basics and he seemed more relaxed today,” Kelso, who trains with wife Bev Kelso, said.
“I think Sam suited her and she will be riding in the King’s Plate.”
Alabama Lass will have a travelling companion on her trip from Matamata to Ellerslie, with Legarto favourite for the Bonecrusher New Zealand Stakes and pleasing the Kelsos with her work between races at Ellerslie on Saturday.
“We took her there because by the time we get to Champions Day, she will have had a month between races,” Ken Kelso said.
“It also gave Opie another ride on her before he rides her in the Bonecrusher and we are very happy with where she is at.”
Bosson also rode favourite Towering Vision, who finished an uninspiring last in the Avondale Guineas on Saturday, but co-trainer Sam Bergerson says the gelding is still going to the Derby in 12 days.
Te Akau will also have Belle Cheval, to be ridden by Mick Dee, in the NZB Kiwi, alongside He Who Dares and La Dorada.
But they will only have Lara Antipova and Out Of The Blue in the Group 1 Sistema Stakes, with beaten Karaka Millions favourite Kinnaird to miss Champions Day and be aimed at the Sires’ Produce at Trentham on March 28.
The sprinting star of the New Zealand summer won’t be seen again until next season.
Trainer David Greene says First Five, winner of both the Telegraph and BCD Sprint at Group 1 level, has headed to the spelling paddock.
“We weighed up a couple of options in Australia but decided on the spelling paddock instead,” Greene said.
“We want to make sure if we take him across there, he is at the top of his game, not at the end of a prep.
“He is still lightly raced and we are looking forward to the next couple of seasons so we are happy to wait.”
He isn’t the only Group 1 sprinter in the paddock, with last season’s Railway winner Crocetti having time off after a lacklustre campaign.
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.