For once this season promising filly Shockoe Slip has everything in her favour to break through for an overdue win at Avondale today.
The track is firmer than in recent weeks, the field is weaker than most that have kept her winless until now, and best of all for Ardmore
trainer Jamie Graham the niggling setbacks are behind her.
"I certainly can't offer any excuses if she's beaten," said Graham, who is without a specialist jumper in his team for the first time since he began training in 1989.
"She's working well, is fit enough and the track should be to her liking."
If Shockoe Slip reproduces an effort similar to a couple of close-up runs over summer, today's 1200m maiden assignment should be a formality for the Sandtrap three-year-old.
In December she had a handy field of maidens covered at Ellerslie until Paparazzi Charm burst her bubble with a devastating final 150m sprint.
Then next time out, on New Year's Day, at Ellerslie she gave an even stronger special-conditions field a similar fright before weakening late for a close-up seventh.
Shockoe Slip has been plagued by annoying problems so far in this campaign, including a bad seasonal affliction last time out at Ellerslie on May 14.
Graham is confident that won't be a factor again today for a filly who will jump and go forward on a track that usually suits on-pace runners, especially at this time of the year.
On a day when the maidens are equally as inspiring as the race-winners, the Leanne Poulson-trained Inoneday should start the day off with a breakthrough victory in the maiden highweight.
The Four Seasons gelding had the look of a next-up winner with his last-start second to Unladylike at Te Awamutu.
