By MIKE DILLON
You're heartless if you don't feel for Chris and Colleen Wood.
And for the owners of Kaapstad Way.
There is little likelihood of a suitable track for the luckless stayer in Saturday's $100,000 Waikato Times Gold Cup.
Which means if he misses this weekend he will probably have an outing at
Tuesday's Paeroa trials with the Manawatu Cup as a possible lead-up to the $350,000 Westbury Stud Auckland Cup.
"All we can do is accept and pull him out if the track isn't firm," said Chris Wood last night. "We're used to paying up and scratching."
This time the forfeit is the $672 acceptance fee.
In the Melbourne Cup it was $A20,000.
* * *
Someone had to do it and it was David Bradford.
The Sunday News racing editor has included a definitive tale of champion mare Sunline in his New Zealand Racing Annual and done it in a novel way.
The book is two-sided, with the usual review of the racing season's glamorous high points taking up 109 pages, backed up the other end by a 51-page summation of Sunline's background from conception to this spring.
The clean, beautifully illustrated layout of the Sunline section is impressive.
* * *
If you want to have a blue with Sydney trainer Bob Thomsen, mention you thought Shogun Lodge failed in last year's Hong Kong International Cup.
Shogun Lodge finished 6.5 lengths behind Fantastic Light in the cup, a run Thomsen claims was one of his career best.
"You can't tell me the cup wasn't the best race run anywhere in the world last year.
"My horse wasn't disgraced, he was eight lengths from the leaders at the 800m and couldn't win given the amazing sectionals they ran in that race.
"He did well to be only six lengths away. Fantastic Light was camped on the leaders all the way and he's gone on to prove himself one of the best horses in the world, if not the best.
"Jim And Tonic ran third and he's beaten horses like Sunline and Fairy King Prawn."
Thomsen and raceday jockey Shane Dye believe Shogun Lodge has had a better preparation this year and feel Sunday's Hong Kong Mile will suit better than the 2000m of the Cup.
"He felt bright," said Dye after riding Shogun Lodge in trackwork at Sha Tin on Monday.
"He was probably a little bit flat after a long campaign in Australia last year."
