Racing: Crusher's feat hard to follow

It is 19 years since Bonecrusher won the AJC Derby for New Zealand at Randwick.

Our unbeaten star Xcellent will make it seem a lot less if he can get over the line in the A$1.8 million Derby on Saturday.

New Zealand has produced placegetters since Bonecrusher, but essentially the Australians have been too good for us.

Precocious Lad finished second the year after Bonecrusher and it was not until 1992 that we next figured when Veandercross and Cavallieri finished second and third to Naturalism, the connections of Veandercross unsuccessfully protesting against the winner.

Kaaptive Edition was the runner-up in 1993 and it was another eight years before Sir Clive and Danamite finished second and third in 2001.

New Zealand punters are not the only ones who believe Xcellent can turn that record around and win the Derby - the Australian TAB has the Matamata 3-year-old as its $2.60 favourite.

It is a lofty task to be the first since the mighty Bonecrusher to do anything, but there are two major positives for this Derby - the Australian 3-year-olds this season do not appear to be anything out of the ordinary and in winning his only four starts Xcellent has looked something very special.

The Mike and Paul Moroney stable was not taking the job lightly as they loaded Xcellent onto the flight to Sydney last night.

"He has to face his first flight and his first real trip away and that's never easy," said Paul Moroney, "but we feel he has the demeanour to cope.

"For the last two weeks we've put him with Danex, who is also making the trip to Sydney and the two have mated up beautifully."

Going into a race like the 2400m AJC Derby on an incredibly light preparation breaks all conventional rules on horse training, but the stable broke all those rules, successfully winning the $500,000 Mercedes Derby at Ellerslie.

Paul Moroney says if you didn't intimately know Xcellent physically you would think the exercise game plan this time was way off.

"He's such a different beast physically to what he was a couple of months ago. In his body he looks so much more undertrained than he did before the Derby here, but it's only because he's filled out his body with maturity.

"In fact, we've been able to put much more work into him this time than we were able to before Ellerslie. He had four to five gallops max in a four-week period leading up to Ellerslie and he's had that much in the last 10 days this time.

"After every gallop we've taken blood and it's shown that he's improved each time, so much so that we had to gallop him again on Tuesday, whereas we would normally restrict him to threequarter pace."

Raceday rider Michael Coleman climbed off Xcellent after that gallop and said the 3-year-old was as well as at any previous stage of his season.

The No 10 barrier out of the 12 runners delights the camp.

"We wanted to draw out - the last thing we needed was the high class Australian jockeys having the opportunity to hamper him up on the rail. This way Michael can dictate where the horse is in running and please himself when he makes his run."

Moroney sees the Lee Freedman-trained Stella Grande as the danger.

"Lee Freedman is an outstanding horse trainer, his team is on fire and no one does it better when preparing a horse for a big race."

Mark Walker's fine filly That's Tops accompanied Xcellent and Danex on the flight, the one defection being in-form stayer Envoy, who had his Australian campaign cancelled when it started raining in Sydney on Tuesday.

Australian Jockey Club racing manager Colin Tuck said it was still raining yesterday and that to 7.00am 78mm had fallen at Randwick.

"The forecast is for showers continuing for the next couple of days and a fine day for Saturday.

"Right now the track is heavy."

Moroney is not yet concerned.

"I have no idea how Xcellent will manage a wet track, but before he raced first Michael Coleman told us the horse would need rain.

"If you remember, last year there was torrential rain in Sydney on Good Friday - even to the extent some were saying they wouldn't race the next day. The track dried so well they ran 1200m in 1.10 and 1600m in 1.35. Randwick is Australia's best drying racetrack."

On 'off' track is unlikely to affect New Zealand's other strong Derby chance, King Johny.

He made ground strongly from second last in the Parramatta Stakes in his Australian debut at Rosehill last Saturday. The step up in distance to 2400m is ideal for him.

Any easing of the footing for Saturday would assist That's Tops, a closing second in the group one NZ Bloodstock Thoroughbred Breeders Stakes at Te Aroha.

A$1.8m AJC Derby

* Xcellent is looking to end a long run of outs for New Zealand in the Derby.

* Co-trainer Paul Moroney says Xcellent is able to withstand much tougher training.

* The No 10 barrier draw pleases the Moroneys.

* Considerable rain has fallen at Randwick and more is expected.