Price confident winning filly will become Classic contender

There are a few Group 1 nominations alongside the name of Our Gold Hope but co-trainer Luke Price has his eyes on a home track feature for the promising filly.

The three-year-old takes an important step toward the Group 3 Kembla Grange Classic in a couple of weeks when she tackles the Ghaiyyath First Yearlings Handicap (1500m) at Rosehill on Wednesday.

While she is among the entries for this weekend’s Group 1 Surround Stakes, Price said asking her to take a smaller rise in class on her second-up Hawkesbury win was a better path.

“We’re hoping it can all come together,” Price said.

“The Surround was something we thought we better nominate for just in case, but it was never a target race because I don’t think we’ll see her at her best until she gets to a mile.

“We go to the races confident she runs a really good race.”

Our Gold Hope has won two of her four starts for Robert and Luke Price and particularly impressed the stable with how she accounted for her rivals second-up.

And Price said it’s encouraging to see the form prove to be strong with both runner-up Countyourblessings and third-placed The Crimson Idol winning at their next starts.

“We’ve got a good opinion of the filly and I went to the races at Hawkesbury knowing John’s horse (Countyourblessings) would be hard to beat but I was also quite confident,” he said.