It is not often a horse races over three successive Saturdays, but when you are Punch Lane and the track is wet, it is almost a crime if you don’t have a crack.
That is the simple philosophy for trainer Sam Freedman and the mudlark, which starts favourite in Saturday’s Hawkesbury Cup (1600) on an expected heavy deck.
Punch Lane romps home to win at Randwick last Saturday.Credit: Getty Images
Punch Lane and jockey Nash Rawiller stacked up the field and then roared away from their rivals over the final 200m at Randwick last Saturday.
Victory at the standalone meeting will ensure Punch Lane gains a start in the Big Dance in the spring. For the next little while, Freedman is happy to keep chasing the miserable weather.
“This race was definitely considered as soon as he won last weekend,” Freedman said. “We toyed with not running him last week and waiting, but he’s just extremely effective on soft and heavy ground.
“This will be the third week in a row running. It’s not easy, but he’s pulling up well from his runs, and he’s in great form. It’s certainly worth a throw at the stump.”
Most punters would have assumed a race on a soft track would have taken a physical toll, but it is not always the case, says Freedman.
“It’s horses for courses, but the ones that handle it, they pull up really well,” he said.
“Racing is strenuous exercise for them, but the one thing in his favour is he handles heavy ground so well – he pulls up super.
“It can be a bit different to a firm track when they can feel the concussion a bit more. We’ve always found it easier backing up horses from heavier tracks.
“It can take a bit of the sprint out of them, but he’s an on-speed horse, he only needs to maintain a solid gallop, and he can reproduce a similar performance [to last weekend].”
Punch Lane enjoyed a beach swim on Thursday and is likely to head to Queensland for a fourth-up run in the next few weeks. Freedman said Punch Lane could be an ideal Stradbroke horse over 1400m.
Stablemate Green Fly, which started his career in Europe and was doing his best work flashing home late behind Punch Lane last weekend, will also start in the Hawkesbury Cup, and “is a horse that can turn the tables, but is also a horse that needs a bit of luck”, because of his racing pattern to get back. Green Fly did leap out of the ground to win the previous start.
Meanwhile, Freedman will look to get on the board early with Wentworth Falls in the Clarendon Stakes. The two-year-old, named after the glorious Blue Mountains suburb, caught the eye when flashing home for third second up.
