Racing: Trainer says Coventina Bay can’t win — but will try

Coventina Bay. Photo / Supplied

Trainer Robbie Patterson believes there are two reasons his outstanding mare Coventina Bay can’t win today’s $350,000 Telegraph at Trentham, and two other reasons why it makes sense to try.

The Group 1 sprint is the highlight of the opening day of the Wellington Cup carnival and historically the second leg of New Zealand’s great sprinting double, but coming just 13 days after the Railway at Te Rapa, it is down a level on that race.

It still boasts defending champion Levante and Railway runner-up Babylon Berlin, and they are the two reasons Patterson says Coventina Bay would do well to run third today.

“She doesn’t have the early speed of these really quick 1200m horses, so she will be back on the rail and charging home late,” says Patterson. “She will be giving Babylon Berlin five lengths, and she can’t do that and run past her. And while she will be closer to Levante, she will be behind her starting the last 400m as well, and we aren’t going to be running past her either.

“So I think a good result for her would be charging into third, and a Group 1 sprint placing next to her name won’t do her any harm later in life as a broodmare.”

The goal of a Telegraph placing and the value it could add to Coventina Bay’s foal in the modern speed-obsessed breeding world is one of the reasons it makes sense for her to start in a race the usually cocky Patterson thinks he can’t win.

The other reason is today’s 1200m should provide the ideal clean-out of her lungs before the Thorndon Mile back at Trentham in two weeks, a race Coventina Bay ran second in last season and is set to face La Crique in this month.

The market for today’s Telegraph agrees with Patterson, even if Levante is at short odds for a mare who could be giving second favourite Babylon Berlin a good start at the top of the course proper.

But reports from co-trainer Ken Kelso and champion jockey Opie Bosson, who rode against Levante in trackwork on Tuesday, suggest she will be a lot sharper today than she was when third in the Railway, so the Telegraph should be hers to lose.

Plenty of today’s black-type races will provide crucial market pointers to the Group 1 races ahead. The Trentham Stakes gives Ladies Man a chance to solidify his favouritism for the Wellington Cup but he meets a strong contender in Campionessa.

Her effort to win a listed 2500m race at Riccarton on November 5 and then fresh-up at her next start, the Group 2 Rich Hill Mile, was remarkable and a stunning training feat from Mark Walker, so at the in-between distance of 2100m, she has to be hard to beat at the weights.

● Sharp ‘N’ Smart is out of today’s Group 2 Wellington Guineas at Trentham with a stone bruise.

“I couldn’t have been happier with his gallop [on Thursday] but before the truck left [yesterday] he had a bit of heat in one foot,” said Graeme Rogerson, who trains in partnership with wife Debbie.

“Within three hours, he was certainly a lot better, and he should be perfect within 48 hours. It was a 50/50 call but I thought it was in the best interests of the horse not to run.”