Fresh from a winning treble on The Everest day, Gerald Ryan isn’t giving up on causing another major boilover with a two-pronged attack on group 1 winner Golden Mile in the Callander-Presnell.
Having celebrated his first group 1 in partnership with Sterling Alexiou in the Epsom before a bag of winners on Sydney’s signature spring carnival day, Ryan is desperate for the rain to stay away before the $1 million feature at Royal Randwick on Saturday.
Gerald Ryan and training partner Sterling Alexiou prepared a winning treble on The Everest day.Credit:Getty
Golden Rose contender Brosnan will join last week’s stakes-winning filly A Lot More Love hunting down Caulfield Guineas winner Golden Mile, who will return to Sydney as a raging favourite for the Callander-Presnell.
“Brosnan has been hampered by wet tracks and you can’t get a decent crack at him,” Ryan said. “He’s going too far between runs. His run through the line in the Golden Rose wasn’t that bad. [Jockey] Tim [Clark] was quite upbeat about it. We just want the rain to stay away for him.
“The other filly, it doesn’t matter whether it’s wet or dry. She’s done really well since last week so we decided to back her up otherwise she would have been in the paddock.”
Golden Mile was a firming $1.75 favourite with Sportsbet on Thursday to bank another huge cheque, but Ryan wasn’t dismissing the chances of A Lot More Love ($10) and Brosnan ($23) being in the finish.
Brosnan was beaten more than four lengths by Golden Mile in his first run of the spring and was then safely held when 13th behind Jacquinot in the Golden Rose. Golden Mile was fourth in the same race and then emerged victorious from a bunched finish in the Caulfield Guineas.
Asked the better of his two chances, Ryan said: “It will depend how the track plays. If the track is dry it will bring the grey horse [Brosnan] into it, but the filly has drawn a good gate, she’s going to get a good run and she’s fit.
“I go back and have a look at her form in the autumn. She never finished further back than fourth and she ran Matcha Latte to a neck from back in the field and she was about the only one all day who finished off. She also had form in the autumn behind Williamsburg.”
Williamsburg will carry the stable’s hopes in the group 1 Spring Champion Stakes following his Dulcify Stakes win with a fast-closing third in the rescheduled Gloaming Stakes at Warwick Farm. The race was moved from Royal Randwick and cut back to a mile.
“He’s been aimed at the race all the way along ever since he was a two-year-old,” Ryan said.
“He’s had a good prep and the only negative was having to go back to 1600 metres around Warwick Farm after Randwick was called off. But I thought he hit the line really well and I think every race he’s been in he’s hit the line well.”
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