BOXING DAY RACES PREVIEW
BOXING Day racing at Geelong has been pretty favourable to trainer Danny O’Brien in the past.
Only three years ago an 18year-old English apprentice named Kieran Shoemark helped O’Brien to a treble, with Zahspeed, Moonlight Graham and Cincinnati all saluting.
Today, another UK teenager named Joshua Bryan can hand the Barwon Heads trainer a late Christmas present when he rides a pair of gallopers at Geelong.
“He’s a young Welsh apprentice to Andrew Balding in England,” O’Brien said of the 18-year-old.
“We’ve had a couple of Andrew’s apprentices come out — we’ve had Oisin Murphy and Kieran Shoemark who have come out over the last four or five years.
“Josh is coming from the same stable, just out here for a bit of experience over the Christmas-New Year period.
“They’re handy those kids because they can still claim 2kg in the country and they’re very good riders. He hasn’t ridden a winner yet, he rode a second or third for us last week so hopefully he can get on the board for us on Boxing Day.”
Leading the stable’s pair of chances is So Little Time, a winner at Geelong on debut who performed admirably at his second start, finishing fifth at Bendigo earlier this month.
“It was still a good enough run, obviously his second start in a race, he was still learning,” O’Brien said.
“I thought his run was good enough for where he’s coming from and he’s come on well since. He drops back in grade so it looks like a nice enough race for him.”
Meanwhile, another Eales Racing gelding runs for O’Brien later in the afternoon.
“Dreaded is in a much more suitable race,” O’Brien said.
“He’s dropping back to a benchmark 58 and he’s run well at Geelong previous to us getting him, so we’re certainly hoping he’s a good hope as well in the 2400m race.”