The Gold Coast Bulletin

Moodie confident General can salute

- BRAD WATERS

PROMINENT Victorian owner David Moodie is no fan of the Blue Diamond entry system but he will be out to make it work for him a third time when General Beau runs in Saturday’s $1.5 million race.

Moodie breeds dozens of two-year-olds every year but he doesn’t pay the fees to keep them entered throughout the long process leading up to each year’s Blue Diamond or Golden Slipper.

His approach compels him to pay late entry fees to run his horses in rich two-year-old races.

But the idea paid off when Hurricane Sky (1994) and Paint (1997) won the Blue Diamond, while Crystal Lily won the Golden Slipper carrying his colours in 2010.

“We race a few and if you were going to pay up for all of them, it would be just pay, pay, pay all the time,” the former Racing Victoria chairman said.

“I’m completely opposed to all this early nomination process of yearlings for the Blue Diamond and Golden Slipper, which starts in June or July the year before.

“Half of them aren’t named, they aren’t broken in and you’ve got no idea about them.

“You have to pay three or four times at various stages and you’re guessing the whole time.

“If you get the occasional one that warrants a run, like this horse (General Beau), it probably all balances out the same anyway.”

Moodie and General Beau’s other owners paid the $55,000 late entry fee to run in Saturday’s Blue Diamond Stakes. However, the Mathew Ellerton and Simon Zahra-trained colt has banked more than $300,000 in his three wins and a second in four outings.

Finishing in the first four would give General Beau’s connection­s a profit on their investment.

But Moodie said the late entry fee would not have been paid unless the son of Brazen Beau was a serious chance of winning the $900,000 first prize. “You don’t really go into those races unless you think you’ve got a live chance,” Moodie said.

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