Captured By Love winning at Taranaki on February 3.
A few quiet minutes standing still on Thursday might help Captured By Love run fast in the $150,000 Sarten Memorial at Te Rapa today.
The flying filly takes on the boys in the Group 2 and will be a warm favourite after a jaw-dropping performance in the Hawke’s Bay Guineas at Matamata last start.
Captured By Love reared as the starting gates opened that day and lost six lengths before staging a huge recovery to finish third, beaten a neck by Savaglee and So Naive, two of her rivals today.
As good as they are, Captured By Love might be a little better, but to monetise that she will need to jump away with her rivals in today’s 1400m, and co-trainer Sam Bergerson is confident she will.
“It isn’t usually an issue for her and she just reared at the wrong time, but everybody saw what she did after,” he told the Herald.
To ease everybody’s minds, including the filly herself, Bergerson and training partner Mark Walker took Captured By Love to the Matamata track on Thursday and had her stand in the race-day starting gates.
“On Thursdays, they have jump-outs from the race-day gates, which is really handy to give horses that experience,” explains Bergerson.
“So we took that opportunity to take her across and just let her stand in the gates for a few minutes, spend some time there and get her head around it again.
“She wasn’t fractious at all and I can’t see it being a factor, so we are confident she will be fine.”
If Captured By Love does jump evenly with the boys, she is the one to beat in a race that could decide whether she heads next to the 2000 Guineas (November 9) or 1000 Guineas (November 16).
“We honestly haven’t made a decision and won’t until after this race,” says Bergerson.
While there is no doubting Captured By Love’s talent, today’s race will be no walkover as there is plenty of depth in the boys’ ranks.
Savaglee has come back an even better colt this season than last term, and while he has a wide draw, he does tend to put himself into his races and has genuine class.
So Naive is underrated and could jump straight on to the speed for the in-form Wallace/Cooksley stable, and at $9 and $2.40, he looks over the odds.
Add in Sought After, the first horse taken for a slot in the $3.5 million NZB Kiwi, Super Photon and Whiskey N Roses and a couple of debut winners, and today’s race will clarify the 2000 Guineas picture in a big way.
Earlier in the card, a former age-group star from the Walker/Bergerson stable in Wild Night faces a wide draw and a class mare in Lux Libertas in the open 1400m.
Wild Night was excellent winning the 1300m at Matamata on October 2, but will jump from barrier 13 today.
“That won’t help, but if he can get a cart into it, he can still win because he is working very well,” says Bergerson.
Lux Libertas has won five of her eight starts and regular jockey Warren Kennedy is adamant she is a black-type mare-in-waiting, but all of her races have been on wet tracks.
How she performs on top of the ground today could go a long way towards deciding what her summer looks like.
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.