CLASSY mare Cullens Angel has the $30,000 Granny Smith Stakes firmly in her sights following a narrow but impressive win in Granny Smith prelude at The TOTE Racing Centre in Launceston on Sunday night.
Cullens Angel was sent out the $1.30 favourite and although she only managed to defeat one of the rank outsiders Antheas Angel by a neck it was the way she went about her business that impressed.
The Phillip Ford-trained four-year-old mare has gone ahead in leaps and bounds this season.
She arrived in Ford’s stables early last year and did very little at her first five attempts in May-June last year.
She resumed with a win in a C0-C1 in Hobart in November and has won four of her subsequent six starts including this latest effort.
“She will be improved by that run – it’s the first time she’s had to any work,” Ford said.
The Granny Smith will be run on the small showground circuit at Devonport on Anzac Day (night) but at her only four visits to that track she has finished no better than seventh.
“She didn’t handle the Devonport track 100 per cent last time she raced there but she’s a lot more tractable now,” Ford said.
Cullens Angel, that joined the Ford stable early this season, is by New Zealand sire Christian Cullen from the Ticket To Heaven mare Ticket To Angel and is raced by her breeder Peter Walker.