Horse Racing Chandon Ladies Day 2022 form guide, tips, predictions, Coolmore Classic, Flemington Group 1s

Horse Racing Chandon Ladies Day 2022 form guide, tips, predictions, Coolmore Classic, Flemington Group 1s



Sydney’s autumn racing carnival takes a big splash forward on Saturday with Rosehill’s annual “pink” Chandon Ladies Day launching the Golden Slipper Carnival. There’s a major day down south too with two time-honoured events at Flemington. Here’s what you need to know with our ultimate guide.

The cynical might say Sydney’s phenomenal rainfall can only mean one thing. No, not climate change – though there is that too – but that there must be an autumn carnival going on.

The Harbour City, so-named because it’s now a city that looks a lot like a harbour, is the place to be for turf fans in March and April in particular, with a host of headline races to start the juices flowing.

Less fortunately, the autumn always gets the rain flowing just as certainly, but at least – hard as it is for Sydneysiders to believe – the forecast is deluge-free between now and Saturday, before normal downpours resume next week.

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Following a few weeks of lead-up action, Rosehill’s major carnival kicks off on Saturday with Chandon Ladies Day – a pink day on course with a link to the McGrath Foundation, highlighted by the Group 1 Coolmore Classic (1500m), fittingly for fillies and mares. It’s the day things swing up a notch in Sydney for its big carnival, leading into The Championships at Randwick from early April.

Aside from an appearance in the Coolmore from perhaps one of the nation’s most exciting horses in Espiona, there’s also the last chance for the youngsters to qualify for Saturday week’s $5 million Golden Slipper Stakes, Australia’s annual two-year-old highlight and the richest race for juveniles in the world.

There’ll be plenty of action in Melbourne, too, with Flemington’s autumn “Super Saturday” featuring two Group 1s in the Newmarket Handicap (1200m) and the Australian Cup (2000m).

Racing, unlike much else, has enjoyed a major boom through the pandemic – a fact reflected in the record prices being paid at the annual yearling sales held at this time of year. The action on the track is about to hot up.

WHAT IS IT?

Chandon Ladies Day at Rosehill Gardens, western Sydney’s premier racecourse – a packed 10-race programme highlighted by the Group 1 Coolmore Classic, plus two Group 2s and four Group 3s. First race 12.20pm, last race 5.55pm.

Four days after International Women’s Day, it’s also designed with women in mind and includes the Pink Fashion Lunch which has women of influence guest speakers and helps raise funds for the McGrath Foundation.

The day – likely to be held on a very heavy track (but tune in for upgrades if it’s sunny) – begins three straight Saturdays of top-notch action at Rosehill for its major splash of the year, also featuring the Golden Slipper/Flipper Stakes on March 19, and the Tancred Stakes on March 26.

WHERE CAN YOU WATCH IT?

On Channel 7 and Sky Racing, or else listen to your local racing station and you can follow live on foxsports.com.au.

HIGHLIGHT

Race 8. The Coolmore Classic. 4.40pm

An enthralling gathering of some of the nation’s finest females – aged three and upwards – over 1500m. It’s worth $600,000 but its main value rests in the fact it’s a Group 1, and whoever wins will earn the guarantee of possibly millions more in their value as a broodmare in her breeding career, and in the sales of her offspring. If the Golden Slipper anoints future stallions, then this is one of the country’s best “mare makers”. Its distance – as close as Rosehill gets to a mile (1600m) due to its contours – is key as well, suggesting a winner may impart into her offspring not just pure speed, like a 1200m Slipper winner, but a hint of stamina as well.

And it’s grown in importance and prestige in a relatively short time, having first been held in 1973 when known as just the Fillies & Mares Classic, before several name changes until major stud empire Coolmore was locked in from 1996.

It’s a handicap event, meaning best performed (and usually more experienced) types carry more weight – like Krone, who has topweight of 58kg, and the younger ones less, with Espiona to carry only 50kg despite her sizeable potential.

The winner also gains a free ticket into later Sydney autumn highlights the Doncaster Mile and the Queen Of The Turf Stakes.

Famous winners

Sheraco (1982), Emancipation (1984), Bounding Away (1987), Sunline (2000, 2002), Tuesday Joy (2007), Typhoon Tracy (2009).

Main contenders

While Espiona is favourite, several other high quality females make this a very engrossing contest indeed, with a likely clutch of them hitting the line together, as handicaps can often achieve.

Espiona. This three-year-old filly could go on to great, great things. Like a couple of other famous females in Winx and Verry Elleegant she’s trained by multiple premiership-winner Chris Waller, the man who puts the tense into intense, an empire-runner with 442 horses on his books, and a bloke who must just about be growing tired of accepting trophies. You say Espiona is trained by Waller, but who isn’t, really? He also entered another favourite in Fangirl (but she’s been switched to the Phar Lap Stakes), but his other three starters give him four of the 15.

Espiona is a daughter of relatively new sire Extreme Choice, who went to stud after a brief but spectacular career with big things expected. He was, however, hit by major fertility problems – something you don’t know till you have a go. But from a limited number of runners on the ground, he’s still set the breeding world alight with some phenomenal stats. (Like he’s only had 38 runners and seven of them have won a Group race, or 18 per cent, which is extremely high).

And Espiona quickly put the writing on the wall that she could be one of his very best. She debuted with a blistering four-length win at Warwick Farm in October, albeit in an ordinary maiden, but then stepped up to a 1400m Listed race (the fourth tier, just behind Group 3), at Flemington on Oaks day and won that by 6.5 lengths.

Since then, she’s stumbled a little. She was a raging $1.50 favourite when resuming from a spell at Randwick last month in the Light Fingers Stakes (1200m) but when she looked poised to win, Fangirl bloused her out by a neck. She was favourite again next start in her first G1, the Surround Stakes (1400m) at Randwick but managed only third, 1.3 lengths behind the winner, Hinged. The heavy 10 that day (the boggiest you can go before they call them off) might have tested her, but she’s going to have to likely face that again this week if she’s to prove as good as she suggested last spring. Waller will put pre-race ear muffs on her for the first time to try to keep her calm in the build-up, which sometimes helps.

Early markets have Espiona at around $5. With some leading riders going to Flemington and not many able to get down to the 50kg, Espiona will be ridden by Jay Ford and should have few excuses from barrier four.

Hinged, a $7.50 chance trained by, err, Chris Waller, knocked out Espiona and Fangirl in winning the Surround, giving her two from two on heavy tracks, and with a light 52.5kg she won’t mind the conditions this Saturday one little bit.

Then there’s $7 shot Lighthouse. The five-year-old grey mare, with 56kg, was imported last spring after winning three of nine in her native USA. She quickly won four in a row in Victoria before three fighting seconds in her last three starts, the past two at G1 level, including last week’s Canterbury Stakes (1300m) at Randwick on a heavy 9. She’s had seven Australian runs now without a break since early November. This would usually raise a red flag, but she’s trained by the astounding Ballarat-based partnership of Ciaron Maher and expat Brit David Eustace, who are rapidly tearing up the old rule book on how training should be done.

Another Expat, as in, that’s her name, is at $6.50 and has won eight of 13 for gun Randwick trainer Mark Newnham, including four from five on heavy going. And there’s another in British import Promise Of Success, also at $6.50, who’s trained by the canny John O’Shea, hasn’t missed a placed from three heavy outings, has a light 51kg but does have barrier 13 to contend with.

And that’s just the five at less-than double figure odds. It’s a wide-open race, and heavy form could be the key.

TIPS: 1. Lighthouse; 2. Espiona; 3. Hinged.

V’landys defends Big Dance raceday | 01:35

UNDERCARD

Race 2: Magic Night Stakes (1200m) 12.55pm. Last chance for fillies to earn a place in the Golden Slipper field, with another daughter of Extreme Choice, She’s Extreme, holding favouritism.

TIPS: 1. She’s Extreme; 2. Celestial Spirit; 3. Queen Of The Ball.

Race 3: Pago Pago Stakes (1200m) 1.30pm. Last chance for colts and geldings to see if the Slipper fits. As with the fillies above, it’s implied that those already qualified are better, but the Team Hawkes-trained favourite Magic could be an exception. A $2.5 million yearling – making him the second-highest priced of all the hundreds of yearlings by his super sire Snitzel to go to auction – Magic was held back until debuting with a storming second two weeks ago. That’s made him fifth-favourite for the Slipper, but he’s only 41st in line for that 16-horse event at present, based on prizemoney. Winning this race guarantees a spot.

TIPS: 1. Magic; 2. Sweet Ride; 3. Rise of The Masses.

Race 4. Ajax Stakes (1500m) 2.05pm. A Group 2 for three-year-olds and upwards with locally-trained stallion Ellsberg an odds-on favourite after an easy win in the heavy last start.

TIPS: 1. Ellsberg; 2. Brutality; 3. Just Folk.

Race 6. Phar Lap Stakes (1500m) 3.20pm. Still a mystery why the GOAT only has a Group 2 for three-year-olds named after him, but anyway. Fillies have a great recent record for beating the boys in this event, including Winx (2015) and Verry Elleegant (2019). Another Waller filly – the aforementioned Fangirl – is a raging favourite at around $2.10 after the trainer chose this race over the Coolmore.

TIPS: 1. Fangirl; 2. Character; 3. Silent Impact.

FLEMINGTON

Race 6. Newmarket Handicap (1200m) 3.40pm.

Australia’s greatest sprint race, a Group 1 worth $1.5 million, held up the Straight Six (furlongs) and first run in 1874. It’s an exhaustingly tough sprint, since the finest short-course runners in the land don’t have the chance for a breather around a bend or two. It’s been won by some of the all time greats, such as, in recent history, Black Caviar (2011), Miss Andretti (2007), Takeover Target (2006) and Schillaci (1992).

There’ll be 17 runners stretched across the track, in an extremely open field in which the Waller-trained colt Home Affairs and O’Shea’s Lost And Running head the market, and around the $3.60 mark.

Home Affairs, who’s won four from eight, has a substantial weight for a three-year-old at 56kg but he’s earned it with two stunning G1 runs up the Flemington straight – a three-length win in last spring’s stallion-making Coolmore Stud Stakes (1200m), and a nose victory over more seasoned rival Nature Strip last month in the Lightning Stakes (1000m). He was aided by the weight-for-age scale then, which meant he carried 55.5kg to Nature Strip’s 58.5kg, but does have huge amount of class. The outstanding James McDonald stays on him for this.

Lost And Running is a relatively late bloomer by comparison but has reached the top echelon of Australian sprinters in the past six months, running fourth in Nature Strip’s Everest at Randwick last October, and winning his last two in high quality at Newcastle and Randwick, giving him eight wins from 13 starts all up. He’s got Hugh Bowman aboard and is a tough five-year-old with the same weight as Home Affairs.

Mind you, this is by no means a two-horse race. Five-year-old Team Hawkes-trained Masked Crusader is a high-quality sprinter – hence his topweight of 57kg – who has won a 1200m G1 and ran a barnstorming second to Nature Strip in that Everest last October. He was fifth in his only go up the Flemington straight in the Lightning, but will be motoring home over the extra 200m this time and has the young gun Jye McNeil on top.

The canny Maher-Eustace team have $14 shot Snapdancer, a five-year-old mare with just 52.5kg who’s won her past two in good company, while other key chances include Artorius ($12), Swats That ($17), Quantico ($21), Count De Rupee ($27) and a handful more. Should be a great race.

TIPS: 1. Masked Crusader; 2. Home Affairs; 3. Lost And Running.

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Home Affairs ridden by James McDonald returns to the mounting yard after winning the Black Caviar Lightning at Flemington Racecourse on February 19.Source: Getty Images

Race 7. Australian Cup (2000m) 4.20pm

Another time-honoured $1.5m Group 1, this one under weight-for-age conditions which, unlike handicaps, is designed to allow the best to prosper.

It was first held just two years after the first Melbourne Cup in 1863, and the list of great winners goes on and on: Makybe Diva, Lonhro, and Northerly won it all in a row from 2003-2005 for heaven’s sake. There was Saintly (1996), Let’s Elope (1992), Better Loosen Up (1991), Vo Rogue (1989) and Bonecrusher (1987), so it’s a race for the best, over one of the toughest distances there is, with the old mile-and-a-quarter demanding strength, endurance and decent cruising speeds as well.

This year it’s an intriguing 12-horse field headed by Wollongong hero Think It Over, a Sydney G1 winner who’s been switched south to avoid the rain. It’s his first go anti-clockwise, but he’s well suited by the WFA scale and is favourite at around $3.

There’sformer Brit Spanish Mission, a strong chance at around $4.40. The six-year-old stallion ran so well for third in last year’s Melbourne Cup before staying here in a switch to the Peter Moody stable, for whom he ran a strong third first-up over 1600m at Caulfield last month.

The next line of betting is a bookending battle of the bros, with James Cummings’ gelding Cascadian carrying the No 1 saddlecloth at around $8.50 after winning a Caulfield 1800m G2 last start,and Edward Cummings’ Queensland Oaks-winning mare Duais the No 12 at $8, having pushed home strongly for a close sixth to Verry Elleegant in a Randwick 1600m G1 last start.

TIPS: 1. Spanish Mission; 2. Duais; 3. Think It Over;

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Trevor Marshallsea is the best-selling author of books on Makybe Diva, Winx, and Peter Moody.

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