 | RACING HISTORY |
YEAR: 2001
FEATURE RACE COMMENT
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| Flight South outfinishes Kym's Girl and Flash Tactics |
It is hard to recall the last time Kym's Girl was caught from behind. She was on one of her trademark blistering runs when she was overtaken surprisingly by Flight South with 100 metres to run.
Surprisingly, too, because it was no contest. Flight South went by in a few thumping strides, winning the $25,000 Pyne Gould Guinness NZ Premier Mares Championship by an increasing margin in a fast 2:21 for the mobile 1950m, which was a 1:56.3 mile rate. This was 0.7 seconds faster than Adio Routine's NZ mares' record, or would have been had there not been a cruel collapse of the electronic timing system; so no record because the timing was a human clocking and thus unofficial.
That bad or sad business aside, Flight South was awesome and it bodes well for further success in the Caduceus Club-sponsored Standardbred Breeders' Stakes on Thursday night. There should be some confidence about this because astute trainer Andrew Neal thinks there is a handsome improvement to come and she will be close to unbeatable of he is even half right.
Neal says Flight South "proved a point" by her win. The point he had in mind was removing the general suspicion that her Auckland Cup upset win as a C7 from off the ballot was the result of a rare failure on the part of others. Neal has never thought of it that way, always maintaining that she had competed against the same horses with credibility. In two starts since her Auckland Cup win, Flight South was out of the money, and Neal blames himself for one of the two, and knows they may have given volume to those still in doubt of her class. "They were both non events. One was a free-for-all at Alexandra Park where they walked and sprinted home, and the other was a bad drive by me at Cambridge. I put too much thought into it and made a tactical error," he said.
In the latest confirmation of her class, Flight South raced with a nasal strip, as she did for the first time in the Auckland Cup. It keeps the nostrils open, and helps their recovery after a race," he said. Flight South has the Inter-Dominions in Brisbane to follow the Breeders' Stakes, and Neal is serious about her chances. "I got 100 to 1 before her race tonight. I don't think she will be at anything like that now,"he said.
Neal says Pacific South, the dam of Flight South, is in foal to the In The Pocket horse, Tinted Cloud, and he took one of the few opportunities left to stock up on the Direct Flights by spending $4800 on a colt by the deceased horse from Joyella at the Yearling Sales in Christchurch last week. In the meantime, Flight South is at Motukarara where she is enjoying working on the grass track.
Credit: Mike Grainger writing in HRWeekly 14Mar01