Ahrens confident King can rule at the ‘Desert
LOCAL trainer Ben Ahrens is confident King Of The Desert can deliver him a hometown win when he returns to Beaudesert this afternoon.
King Of The Desert broke through for a maiden race win at the Gold Coast last start and Ahrens was impressed with the performance, but he believes the Moshe gelding still has the scope to improve in the Benchmark 60 event.
“He has been doing a pretty good job,” Ahrens said. “He is still doing a little bit wrong but he does the basics right.
“He jumps, puts himself in a good position and he gives a good kick when you ask him to go. At his last start he still wanted to wander around in the straight and he just wanted to wait for them a little bit.
“It wasn’t until the last little bit that Luke (Dittman) put him under real pressure that he started to get away from them again on the line.
“He is doing well and I expect him to run well again.”
King Of The Desert has not raced at Beaudesert but Ahrens said the three-year-old had plenty of experience at the track and he was adamant the tight-turning track could actually prove to be an advantage for this galloper.
“He has had a couple of jumpouts over at Beaudesert and the second one that he had he ran really good time,” Ahrens said. “He seems to enjoy the home track and he has shown him in the past that he does handle it.
“It is always a little bit of an advantage because it is a quirky track Beaudesert. It is tight-turning and it always advantages the local horses.
“Everybody expects your horses to run well when they go back there and I think that he will do that.
“It is always good to win a race on your home track.”
Ahrens has trained 39 winners at Beaudesert in his career and has had four winners and five placegetters from only 21 runners there this season.
He also has California Spyder engaged in Race 5, while Lucky Fix will be scratched from this afternoon’s meeting and instead run at the Sunshine Coast tomorrow with Ron Stewart in the saddle.