Tim Williams confident he has the horsepower to test superstar Marketplace

Bettors Anvil has matured on his recent northern trip and faces his biggest test at Addington tonight. Photo / HRNZ

Tim Williams knows that now or never could end up being never.

But he thinks tonight’s $200,000 Garrards Sires’ Stakes Final at Addington is his best chance to find out whether Bettors Anvil can beat 3-year-old superstar pacer Marketplace.

Williams drives the muscular colt, who is trained by his bosses Steve and Amanda Telfer. He has the best of the barrier draws for the big three in the Group 1 sprint.

The draws are a reversal of the three favourites’ rankings on performance so far: Bettors Anvil has barrier 4 and the gate speed to use it, Got The Chocolates has been our second best 3-year-old and gets barrier 7, while the undoubted star of the crop, Marketplace, starts from the outside of the second line.

Marketplace has won all the races that matter in the past year, but Williams, who is closing in on 1000 career wins, thinks tonight is his best chance to stretch him.

“We have the draw and the chance to use it.

“The trip north has really improved this horse and he knows what it is all about now. He moved really fast when I wanted to lead on him last week and, while that wasn’t against these horses, I think he deserves his chance to do the same again this week.”


That is conservative driver code for “I’d be keen to stay in front” or, at worst, make Got The Chocolates work and then the two pretenders can lead and trail. If Marketplace can work around the field, sit parked and still beat them, so be it.

“We know what a great horse Marketplace is but, hopefully, he will settle a long way behind us so we get our chance,” says Williams.

While Bettors Anvil and Got The Chocolates should sort themselves out in the first 600m, Marketplace has the advantage that the rest aren’t good enough to get in his way. So, when he moves, he should be able to cruise to the parked-out position without too much traffic.

That could leave punters asking themselves a simple question: are you happy taking $1.28 for Marketplace to win sitting parked the last 1000m?

The answer for multi punters might be yes; straight-out-win punters might just wait and watch.

Williams, who sits fourth on the premiership, has a strong book of drives across a stacked Addington programme, rating Seaside Rose (R5), Father Time (R9) and Akatea (R11) as his next best chances.

“Seaside Rose has been going great ... and she will be going forward from her wide draw because she is a front-of-the-field horse,” Williams says.

“She has to be hard to beat because I think she knocked off last start and, while her stablemate [Sweet Diamond] is also racing well, I think my mare is the better chance.”

Williams says Father Time is one of his favourite horses and he’d love to win tonight’s $50,000 NZB Uncut Gem Classic Trot.

“He is a real dude of a horse and Kevin [Townley, trainer] has set him for this race.

“He has trialled well since he last raced and I think, off the front, he will be hard to catch.”

He thinks Akatea should be better suited well drawn tonight over 1980m than she was over 2600m on this track last start. He has no doubts about Double Jeopardy’s ability in Race 8, but also realises he is in a field full of quasi-open class horses.

Tonight’s meeting sees juveniles Fugitive (Race 2) and Duchess Maria (Race 6) expected to repeat their recent Alexandra Park wins, while an even-pacing fillies field in the Bionic Chance Bracelet adds to one of the deepest Addington meetings of the year so far.

Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s Racing Editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.