Barrier no halt to Colt assault
FORGIVE Grant Dixon a small moment of frustration when he saw stable star Colt Thirty One’s barrier draw for Saturday night.
After doing all the work in scorching times for brave placings in the open-class features for the past two weeks, Dixon hoped for a draw where he could dictate the Lucky Creed Open (2680m) at Albion Park.
Instead, he drew inside the back row and will now rely on luck to salvage what would be a deserved win through a brave and luckless winter carnival.
Cruz, the NSW raider, who beat Colt Thirty One the past two weeks, is a notable absentee this time, but there’s still plenty of class opposition headed by former Inter Dominion placegetter Our Uncle Sam and emerging local star Speech Is Silver.
A philosophical Dixon said the draw could turn out to be a blessing.
“At least it’ll be good to see the marker pegs again. You can’t just keep asking him to do all the work like he’s been doing,” he said.
“He’s gone great both times, but I’ll drive him for luck from that draw. The best of Northview Hustler (gate one) would hold the front and run a great race from that draw. Hopefully he does and I can follow him and get a crack at them late.”
Colt Thirty One will have a let-up after this and prepare for Queensland’s biggest openclass races, headed by the Group 1 Blacks A Fake at the end of the year.
Dixon, who trained and drove Governor Jujon to win the Group 2 South-East Derby last Saturday has key runners in both the Group 1 Qbred Triad finals this week.
He said Frontliner “only just” was the pick of his four in the C&G Final, but felt rival Big Wheels would be hard to beat. He is more confident with Jasper, his runner in the fillies’ final.
“We really like her,” he said. “She’s a lovely, neat filly and doing everything right. The draw (six) isn’t too bad, because the best local dangers are drawn the back row.
“Jaziah is up from Victoria and I don’t know a lot about her, but her form looks OK and she’s drawn well (three), but I think our filly will run a great race.”