Hopfgarten’s hefty task
WITH ambitions set a little lower this campaign, Hopfgarten gets his chance to join two of the best ever Weetwood winners when he tackles the iconic sprint at Clifford Park today.
Hopfgarten will set a record for the biggest weight carried to success in decades if he can lump the 59kg today.
You have to back to Kidman’s Cove ( 59.5kg) in 1997 and Seawinne ( 60.5kg) in 1995 to find higher weighted runners to win the race.
Trainer Rob Heathcote considers Hopfgarten has a fair weight given his record and if he can find a little luck off a sticky draw, is good enough to carry it.
“If he can jag a fluky run he’s in the game,” Heathcote said. “He has quality and class and that will take a good horse like him a long way in a race like this.
“He’s had just one jumpout on the dirt and he has a great fresh record, so we’re willing to take the chance with him.
“He’s been around for a long time and a lot of people probably think he’s over the hill because of that, but he’s only seven and compared to Buffering ( who was eight when he won Dubai’s Al Quoz Sprint), he’s a spring chicken.
“Last year we aimed at the biggest races through the carnival, but this year we have decided to scale back a bit and just go for the Listed and Group 3 type races.”
Kevin Kemp yesterday scratched Mr Marbellouz from today’s Class 6 Plate at Toowoomba, but said the horse was “100 per cent” and would take his place in the Weetwood field if there happened to be two scratchings this morning.
“I just didn’t want to risk giving him a torrid run from the wide draw at the 1100m start,” Kemp said.
“I would love for him to get a start in the Weetwood, but if he misses out, there’s a 1200m race we will run in at Doomben in two weeks.”
Meanwhile, Godolphin’s Vin Cox has confirmed defending Stradbroke champ Impending will be back for another tilt on the Queensland winter carnival. That is despite his 2018 service fee hav- ing being released yesterday.
Impending will stand at Darley’s Victorian base off a fee of $ 22,000, but not before he has a final campaign in Queensland.
Cox said the son of Lonhro would trial “in the next week or so” before heading to Queensland.
“He will have a lead- up run ( likely Victory Stakes) before going into the Group 1 BTC Cup and then we will look at options after that,” Cox said.
“The Stradbroke is a definite possibility if he’s going well enough.”