Better B Amazed might have found the right race to kick off the final leg of her career tonight.
The national-record-holding mare is getting close to retirement, with the group one Breeders Stakes at Addington in a few months her last shot at the highest honour before she retires forwhat will be a very commercial broodmare career.
After a difficult summer during which she missed her main aim, the Queen Of Hearts, Better B Amazed has pleased trainer Steve Telfer in her recent work and finds herself back over her favourite distance at Alexandra Park tonight.
She has won five of her seven attempts over 1700m, twice beating open class stablemate No Doctor Needed under those conditions in the spring.
Tonight she meets a mixed bag of horses assessed well below her, an out of sorts Motown and Northview Hustler, who ran out of his skin to finish fifth in the Auckland Cup last start.
Sprint races at Alex Park are often tricky, particularly from wide draws, but if they go hard Better B Amazed can start her final campaign with a win.
Telfer holds a big hand at tonight's first Alex Park meeting of the year with winning hopes in three other races, not bad considering there are only six pacing races on tonight's eight-race card and Telfer doesn't train trotters.
The markets for trotting races are often dominated by trainers John and Josh Dickie and they will have a huge hand to play in the two trots tonight with Sertorius (race two) and Girls On Film (race four).
Sertorius meets some in-form rivals but is far better than his current assessment while Girls On Film is living up to her huge sales price and looks the early Trotting Oaks favourite.
Later in the night the first juvenile fillies race of the season will see Miss Streisand start a warm favourite after she smashed most of her opponents at workouts recently.
Meanwhile, Auckland Cup winner Vincent has been scratched from tomorrow night's A$100,000 Ballarat Cup after bumping a leg yesterday.
"At this stage it is only as a precaution and we will have an ultrasound taken to see how serious it is," said co-trainer Natalie Rasmussen. "But we are hoping to still get him to the Chariots of Fire in Sydney next month."
New Zealand still has Heaven Rocks in the Ballarat Cup and Spankem and The Devil's Own in strong Victoria Derby heats tomorrow night.
