Cheers, this round is on the Barman
THE O’LEARY brothers sure hit on a winning formula when they went looking for a horse to race by southern stallion Yamanin Vital.
Michael, Danny, Shaun and Humphrey O’Leary wanted a tough stayer and the one they found, Who Shot Thebarman, now looks poised to win the Auckland Cup at just his ninth start.
That’s the only conclusion you could draw after watching the fiveyear-old annihilate his opposition in yesterday’s $100,000 Avondale Cup – despite not having raced for nearly two months.
It was a great training feat by Awapuni’s Mark Oulaghan, who brought the horse north to Ellerslie on January 11 for experience on the track, only to see him late scratched after he got under the front of the gates, ripped his saddle off and bolted away up the straight.
Yesterday was his first race since the Manawatu Cup on December 21 and despite racing fiercely out of the home straight, and still being keen turning for home, he still found plenty of reserves to win the 2400m test by two and a half lengths from Skysoblue and Etoile Filante.
Oulaghan said he was concerned about the horse not having raced for so long.
‘‘It was a big ask but he’d done a bit of work and seemed to handle it OK.
‘‘ He’s always had a lot of ability,’’ Oulaghan said. ‘‘ He’s a tough bugger. He’s a Yamanin Vital and they’re tough horses. You can work and train them accordingly.’’ Danny O’Leary told how his brother Michael rang Brian Anderton at White Robe Lodge specifically inquiring whether they had a horse by Yamanin Vital he could buy.
But with a theory that mares milked better when they were young, he stipulated it also had to be a third foal, and out of either a Personal Escort mare or one by Danzighill.
‘‘The only third foal they had was a weanling out of a Carolingian mare but Michael said that would do, settled on $10,000, and said to send it up to Wanganui,’’ That horse, now named Who Shot Thebarman, has won five of only eight starts, is set to give Oulaghan his second big staying plum at Ellerslie.
Just last September he produced Harvest The Gold to win the Great Northern Hurdles, further proof of his prowess with conditioning stayers.
Bagging the Auckland Cup would also give the O’Learys a rare staying double – last May they won the Waikato Steplechase with veteran Rioch, who looked set to dominate the jumping ranks until he broke down again.
Who Shot Thebarman will carry just 52.5kg in the cup, 1kg less than he had yesterday.
If you’re looking for the derby winner from yesterday’s Avondale Guineas only two horses fit the bill – winner Puccini and runner-up Rising Romance – but talk to winning jockey Michael Walker and he’ll tell you there’s only one.
Walker said Puccini could have run two seconds quicker yesterday if he’d had to, despite Rising Romance running him to a length and a quarter at the line.
‘‘He does only what he has to and I’m sure if they come at him, he’ll go quicker,’’ Walker said.
‘‘He’s got a mind of his own this horse. Round at the start he was roaring and neighing at the other horses. I was wondering whether he was thinking about the job at hand or the girls.
‘‘But once he jumps out of gates, he’s a different horse.’’
Walker told trainers Peter and Jacob McKay he had no worries
the about Puccini staying an extra 300 metres in the classic on March 1, nor of being taken on.
‘‘If they want to take him on, it will be at their own peril. I guarantee they’ll break before he does. He’s as tough as teak.’’
But you had only to hear rider Michael Coleman’s report to trainer Donna Logan on Rising Romance, who came with a huge late spurt, to rate her a big threat.
‘‘Michael said he was knocked over on the home turn,’’ Logan said. ‘‘She got really unbalanced and if that hadn’t happened she would have finished a lot closer.
‘‘That was her first race for six weeks and I know who I want my money on in the derby.’’
Few horses have provided Roger James with rollercoaster emotions to match those from training Silent Achiever.
And the ride continued yesterday when the mare, in her first race for four months, overcame topweight of 60 kilos to score a thrilling last stride win over Fix and Undisclosed in the $25,000 Retina Open at Ellerslie.
‘‘To be able to do what she did shows she has that touch of class,’’ James said. ‘‘ It’s very pleasing because she wasn’t wound up for it. We’ve got a lot of bigger fish to fry.’’ James said Silent Achiever’s next start would be either in the Australian Cup at Flemington or the $200,000 NZ Stakes at Ellerslie.
But he was leaning towards the Auckland race on March 8 so as not to flatten the mare with too much travelling. Her main missions are all in Sydney. At fortnightly intervals after the Ellerslie race are the A$ 500,000 Ranvet Stakes, A$1.5 million BMW, which she lost by a nose last year, and A$1 million Sydney Cup.
James will be hoping for more luck than last year when Silent Achiever fell seriously ill with cellulitis just five days before the Melbourne Cup.
‘‘Every leg blew up the size of a post then it got into her body and she was a very sick horse.’’