Big payday not changing Kelso’s approach ahead of Auckland Cup
A historic shot at one of New Zealand racing’s biggest paydays hasn’t changed trainer Ken Kelso’s approach to today’s huge Auckland Cup Day meeting at Ellerslie.
Although the $500,000 Cup is the signature race at the meeting, it is Kelso and his mare Legarto who are set to cash in the biggest today.
The Matamata trainer, who prepares Legarto with wife Bev, has the glamour mare in the $450,000 Bonecrusher New Zealand Stakes, for which she is the $1.40 favourite.
Being a Group 1, the race is a big deal, but even more so for Legarto, as she is poised to win another $500,000 if she finishes in the top four.
That is the main prize as part of the $650,000 Entain Summer Bonus, a points-based promotion for horses who contested three of the four biggest races of the summer.
After finishing second in the Aotearoa Classic and then winning the Herbie Dyke Stakes at Te Rapa, Legarto is the clear leader on the points table, and she would need to finish unplaced and then One Bold Cat win today to be overtaken.
That means if Legarto wins today, her connections collect $758,750, one of the highest stakes won on a New Zealand racetrack.
Kelso, who admits he can get nervy on the biggest racedays, is taking the potential windfall, of which he would get his 10 per cent trainer’s percentage, in his stride.
“It hasn’t changed anything about how I’ve trained her,” Kelso tells the Weekend Herald.
“It has been the same as usual even though it is a lot more money. After all, it’s training horses, it isn’t rocket science,” he says with a smile.
Legarto hasn’t raced since winning the Herbie Dyke on February 10 but pleased Kelso in a recent trial and she is now mentally mature enough to use barrier 2 to her advantage.
Her task was made easier yesterday when Thorndon Mile winner Puntura was scratched from the Bonecrusher, as he will instead head to the A$4 million All Star Mile at Caulfield next week, with regular jockey Craig Grylls getting the call-up.
Legarto looks to have too much class for her rivals and will be many punters’ anchor bet on one of the biggest days of the racing year.
Many will also rightly be keen on Karaka Million winner Velocious in the $450,000 Sistema Stakes, where her greatest threat would appear to be Captured By Love, with luck and who is in the zone on the day likely to decide their clash.
But the $500,000 Auckland Cup is a far more complicated punting puzzle.
Asterix is the logical favourite as a former Derby winner who returned to his best in the Avondale Cup last start, with punters buoyed by the confidence of his trainers Lance O’Sullivan and Andrew Scott.
He wasn’t rehandicapped for winning the Avondale Cup, so looks the logical winner, but 3200m staying races are rarely that formulaic and it often only takes one tearaway leader or mid-race move to change the pattern of the race.
Still, Asterix can win a moderate or punishing Cup, whereas many of his rivals want one or the other.
If it does turn into survival of the fittest, Mark Twain could be the last (young) man standing in a field that spans 4-year-olds to 11-year-olds.
While Ellerslie’s extravaganza will end a summer of racing with many positives for the thoroughbred code, the icing on the cake could come in the A$1.5 million Newmarket at Flemington.
Champion sprinting mare Imperatriz heads a three-pronged Kiwi attack on the Group 1 sprint set to be run in searing heat that has seen the entire Flemington meeting brought forward two hours to dodge the worst of of it.
That means the Newmarket will now be run at 2.45pm New Zealand time, so in the middle of the Ellerslie card.
Imperatriz faces a huge task carrying 58kg under the handicap conditions and will need things to go tactically right from barrier 3, particularly if the outer half of the famous Flemington straight six (1200m) is where jockeys want to be.
Imperatriz’s stablemate Skew Wiff is also in the race, along with the surprise package of the New Zealand racing summer in the unheralded Master Fay.
The veteran of only three starts in three years, one of those in Hong Kong, and trained by one of the great characters of the code in Chad Ormsby, if Master Fay can win, it will be one of the most unlikely Group 1 victories in New Zealand racing history.
Still, fellow Kiwi galloper Roch ’N’ Horse won the Newmarket at 100-1 two years ago when trained by Ormsby’s father-in-law Mike Moroney, so he doesn’t need to look far to be reminded dreams can come true.