TASMANIA’S equine cult hero The Cleaner has the chance to further emphasise the value of buying a horse bred in the state when he steps out in the $3.5 million weight-for-age W. S. Cox Plate over 2040 metres at Moonee Valley on Saturday.
While The Cleaner’s owners have been contemplating what it would feel like owning a Cox Plate winner, the gelding’s trainer Mick Burles has been reshaping his stable star’s training regime that he hopes will give the horse his first Group 1 success.
While most of the other Cox Plate candidates have been tuning up for the weight-for-age championship of Australasia in traditional Group 1 lead-up races in Melbourne, The Cleaner has been pounding the roads at Longford – Rocky Balboa style.
“I felt the horse’s work was becoming a bit lethargic so I decided to give him something completely different and he has thrived on his roadwork around the back of the golf course here at Longford,” Burles said.
The Cleaner has been clocking up the kilometres to the tune of about 10 a day and his trackwork rider David Quinn says the horse feels better than ever.
“One of the secrets to training successfully is to try and keep your horses interested in what they are doing on and off the track and The Cleaner has never looked or felt better at this stage of a preparation, so the change has obviously worked,” Burles said.
The Cleaner was given a grass gallop between races at the night meeting in Launceston last Wednesday with his regular race rider Noel Callow flying in from Melbourne just for the workout.
The Cleaner delivered a sensational workout with his sectionals over the last 600 metres even better than the trainer expected.
By Peter Staples.