Younger brigade emerge to challenge fitter Akuta

Better Knuckle Up won the first running of the $500,000 Velocity Slot Race at Addington last November. Photo / Ajay Berry

Scott Phelan knows Better Knuckle Up and Jeremiah are up to open class.

What their co-trainer doesn’t know is whether that is good enough to win their comeback race at Alexandra Park tonight.

The two 4-year-olds resume for Phelan and senior training partner Barry Purdon in a serious 1700m scamper at Alexandra Park tonight, up against Akuta, who cost punters heavily when beaten in a similar race two weeks ago.

Akuta should be fitter after his third place that night and could be ready to be driven aggressively, with co-trainer Mark Purdon taking the reins. He opened at $1.40 with the TAB.

But his defeat showed Akuta is still very much on the way back up after 20 months away from the track, and Phelan would love to exploit that tonight.

“We all know how good Akuta is, so he is the one to beat,” he says.

“But we are really happy with both of ours. They are working well and are ready to go and, while most horses improve with their first run back in this grade, we think they are pretty ready.”

While Akuta has won a NZ Derby, Taylor Mile and Auckland Cup, Better Knuckle Up has won a race worth almost as much as those three Group 1s added together, as he took out the first running of the $500,000 Velocity Slot Race at Addington last November.

That was the culmination of a gradual rise through the 3-year-old grades last season. He is undoubtedly an open-class pacer in the making, although most horses need a least a few races in the big time to acclimatise.

“Both our horses will be Cup horses this time next year,” says Phelan.

“But that doesn’t mean they can’t win this week if Akuta is vulnerable again.

“While Better Knuckle Up has the big race victory on the board, I actually think there is very little between them and, if I had to select one over the other this week, it could be Jeremiah.

“He was on a bit of a learning curve last year, but he seems very sharp to me now.”

Add in the talented The Surfer and the field has more moving parts than the market may suggest even after the scratching of Treacherous Baby.

Phelan says their best open-class pacer, Merlin, as well as Sooner The Bettor, Duchess Megxit and Cold Chisel, will all be trialling in less than a fortnight as the first two target the Spring Cup on September 19.

“Ideally, they will stay up here for most of their NZ Cup campaigns. We’d love to give them three starts up here before heading south.”

The Purdon/Phelan barn has a strong hand tonight as they start to roll out about 25 horses who will be ready to race over the next month.

“I think Confederate will be a good chance this week. His run last week should have really brought him on.”

The stable has the beautifully bred No More Dreaming (R2, No. 5) making his debut in the TAB Racing Club colours in a stacked juvenile race. Phelan says that, while he can run, he will learn a lot from tonight’s experience.

Two Jules (R4, No.5) has been a sharp improver since coming north to join the stable, and Phelan says she can win again. Tonight’s meeting also sees a rarity in three mobile trot races at Alexandra Park at this stage of the season.

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.