Trainer Edward Cummings didn’t leave a lot of room for error as he plotted an ambitious path to the $10m James Squire Golden Eagle (1500m) with emerging galloper Strait Acer.
Trainer Edward Cummings (Pic: Steve Hart)
With the belief he had a talent, yet to be fully harnessed, on his hands he went about the task of turning a horse that four months ago had just a maiden win to his name into one capable of mixing it with the best four-year-olds in the land.
Strait Acer remains unassuming, an outsider at $34 with TAB on Wednesday, but Cummings will take him to Rosehill Gardens thinking he’s in the game.
“We always knew he had a lot of potential,’’ Cummings said.
“Any horse that works the way he does at home always has that potential so it was a matter of finding a way. It was about mapping out a program, putting him in the right races.
“We actually started him much earlier than we normally would. Because we thought he was ready but we knew we had a task ahead of us to get his rating up sufficiently even to make a race like the Silver Eagle.”
A Class 1 on his home track in early July was the starting point and he just prevailed.
He’d win three of his next four starts, including two Midways and a Benchmark 88, before facing his moment of truth in the $1 million Silver Eagle (1300m) on Everest Day.
“When he stepped out at Hawkesbury first-up and only just got there, there were more than a few sighs of relief we got that result and bump in the rating,’’ he said.
“I would say we were very confident every time we stepped him out, we knew there was more in store.
“The real test was when we had to get him to a mile knowing he was a very big question mark at a mile. Even though he won he showed he is a massive question mark at a genuine mile.
“The four weeks back to the Silver Eagle was D-Day for him.”
It was after the Silver Eagle when Cummings realised the gelding was a sneaky chance in the $10 million feature when he ran past Pericles, trained by his brother James, who was one of the favourites for the Epsom Handicap before being forced to miss that race.
He clocked a race best 33.41 for his last 600m, in coming from well off the pace, and the fastest last 200m of 11.09 (Punter’s Intelligence), as he finished the race breathing down the winner Vienna Princess’s neck.
“Beating Pericles home was a little sweetener. It tells us we’re in the game with a horse that hasn’t found its bottom yet,’’ he said.
“Off a really big peak in the Silver Eagle he comes into this race requiring another one but with a profile to say that he could.”
Tyler Schiller has the ride and from what Cummings sees as an ideal draw he can see the race panning out in a way to give Strait Acer every chance.
“Ideally he’d land midfield, like many of the previous winners, with Tyler Schiller navigating a path into clear air at the top of the straight without having asked the question,’’ he said.
“And then let him sprint for 400m which we know he is capable of and the Silver Eagle proved that. He’s got the turn of foot required for races of this calibre.”
Strait Acer’s charity is Australian Alzheimer’s Research, which will receive 10 per cent of the horse’s prizemoney earned in the Golden Eagle.
– Racing NSW
