In Brief
- Sunny Sanz too good in Cup.
- Soho Senna two from two in Tasmania.
- Cardinal Ringo defies drift in the final.
Sunny Sanz continued on his winning way with a narrow, but impressive win in yesterday’s $12,000 Maxfield Drilling Meander Valley Cup at Carrick Park.
The $3.00 favourite stepped cleanly away from his 10-metre handicap in the 2650 metre event with driver Gareth Rattray positioning the pacer one-out and three-back before enjoying a lovely three-wide cart into the race over the final 1000-metres.
Rattray asked the gelded son of Sportswriter for the supreme effort at the 400m where he let down quickly to loom up to the leader Goggo Gee Gee with Sunny Sanz able to score a narrow but impressive win.
“He got a good cart into the race on the back of El Jays Mystery, I peeled him out four deep at the 500 and he was able to chase the leader down in the straight,” said driver Gareth Rattray after the win.
Gareth picked up the drive while regular driver John Walters is sidelined through injury and Gareth was impressed with the winner of eight races from only nine career starts.
“He has got some potential … there is a motor there but is still very green and is still learning the caper, to run 2650 metres at only his ninth start is a pretty good effort,” explained Gareth.
Trainer Kent Rattray was very pleased with the performance.
“Gareth drove him a treat, it looked like he was going to handle them nicely at the top of the straight but to Goggo Gee Gee’s credit he stuck on really well and made a real race of it,” said Kent who indicated that the pacer’s short term goal is the Carrick Park Pacing Cup on 15 February.
Another highlight on the Carrick Park card was the $10,00 Cressy Transport Tasmanian Country Championship for the three-year-olds with a national rating no higher than 53.
It was the Bianca Heenan trained Soho Senna proving too good by six metres over Rockandahardplace and Tilly Max.
Driver Christian Salter positioned the pacer one-out and one-back before peeling three-wide at the 400-metre mark to win well.
Soho Senna arrived in Tasmania as a five-start maiden and the pacer certainly repaid trainer-owner, Bianca Heenan, on the decision to lease the gelded son of American Ideal who is now undefeated in two Tasmanian starts.
The third feature on the Carrick Park program was the Bramich Bulldozing Trainers Encouragement Final where the $1.65 favourite Cardinal Ringo flew down the outside of the track to score by one metre after racing wide over the final 1200 metres of the race.
The win was the sixth victory recorded by the eight-year-old gelded son of Four Starzz Shark at his 19th racetrack appearance.
Winning trainer Chester Bullock took home a new missile sulky which was donated by the club.
Watch Cardinal Ringo take out the Bramich Bulldozing Trainer Encouragement Final: