Merlin (silver colours) is looking to defend his New Zealand Free-For-All title today. Photo / Ajay Berry
Leading New Zealand driver Zachary Butcher says the hard edge the Australians are bringing to Cup week at Addington could actually help him today.
Today’s Show Day twilight meeting features six black-type races, including the superstars of pacing and trotting backing up from the New Zealand Cup and Dominion on Tuesday into their respective Free-For-Alls.
But the meeting also boasts the two $500,000 slot races and two major juvenile events, and Butcher will find himself starting on the back foot in a few of them.
He partners defending champion Merlin (Race 12, No 10) in the $200,000 Pacing Free-For-All, in which he is the only horse drawn on the second line, while the favourite Meant To Be starts on the unruly, the outside of the second line, in the $500,000 Ascent Trot.
Which is where Butcher hopes the aggression the Australians have shown dominating this week so far actually plays into his hands.
“They have really made Cup week, even though I’d like to see the Kiwis winning a few more races,” Butcher said.
“It has made the racing harder to predict and rather than sometimes here when you think you know your opposition or what the driver may do, it has been more unpredictable.
“I reckon for a horse like Meant To Be that could be a real factor and maybe even a positive. In a lot of his races here, he has been able to work and get parked or lead and still be too good, but that might not be the case this time.
“But that could work in his favour. We have had to be really aggressive on him sometimes but I think he could be potent driven for one run.
“If a couple of those horses up front get rolling like the Aussies can, I think he could sit off then get into a nice rhythm and show some real speed at the end.”
Meant To Be has the motor to overpower his local rivals but the two Australians in the 3-year-old trot, Gatesys Gem and Tracy The Jet, are both high-class fillies.
On her recent Victorian form, Tracy The Jet is going to be awfully hard to run down if she leads.
Merlin bounced out of the New Zealand Cup to win the Free-For-All sitting parked last year, but Butcher says that won’t be happening from number one on the second line tonight.
“I was stoked with him in the Cup and we know he loves the short-course racing, but from one on the second line, I will have a decision to make,” Butcher said.
“There is a lot of gate speed from the really good horses out wide and if they come straight across one of them [they] will likely lead, and I am not sure we can run them down from three or four back on the markers.
“But if they go hard then we might get a shot at them late.”
Leap To Fame is the favourite even from barrier eight as he was enormous in Tuesday’s Cup – even after sitting parked – and of course his conqueror then, Kingman, isn’t in today’s field.
Much like in the Cup, Leap To Fame’s chances could be determined by what Republican Party does inside him.
If Republican Party leads again and stays there, Leap To Fame can still win but becomes vulnerable again, whereas if Leap To Fame rolls to the front early, it is hard to imagine him being attacked and he should win.
Butcher partners Greased Lightnin in the $500,000 Velocity for 3-year-old pacers as he tries to defend the title trainers Barry Purdon and Scott Phelan, with Butcher in the sulky, won with Better Knuckle Up last season.
“I have a good horse with an okay draw but we all know how well Got The Chocolates and Marketplace have been racing,” Butcher said.
“The race shape will come down to whether Marketplace wants to stay in front of hand to Got The Chocolates but I think rather than burning early and undoing my horse, I am better floating across to parked, hopefully taking a sit on Got The Chocolates and getting the last shot at them.”
Butcher has his own mare Mantra Blue (R8, No 8) in the Bob McArdle Classic, a race he’d love to win because of a close family connection, while he finally gets a good draw with the talented War Cry (R9, No 2) in the Dunstan Sires’ Stakes Final.
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.