Photo by Racing and Sports
Thursday, 23 February 2012: Rick Worthington is looking well beyond Saturday's Southern Cross Stakes for resuming stable star Sainthood.
While confident the son of Lonhro will return in excellent order, nine months after breaking down at last year's Brisbane winter carnival, the Sydney trainer knows his six-year-old gelding will have more to offer further down the track.
“He's been off the scene for a long time, traditionally he's not typically a first-up horse,” Worthington said.
“He's in great order and I'm really happy with where he's at. I reckon he's potentially the best he's been period, and that includes before he won the Wagga Cup and the National Sprint.
“Having said that he's only had one trial, and he's still quite fat. I look at Saturday as hopefully a successful launching pad to a successful prep.
“The thing on Saturday for mine it doesn't look like there's going to be speed in the race.
“If there is speed on in the race he'd be able to just have a cruisy time early and be hitting the line hard, but if there's no speed on then obviously he's not going to get that opportunity.”
Worthington is unsure yet where his stakes winner will head after Saturday's race, but he has narrowed the program down to three options.
There's the Group 3 Liverpool City Cup (1300m) in a fortnight or the listed National Sprint (1400m) in Canberra on the same weekend, which Sainthood won in 2010.
And Worthington said the Group 3 Newmarket Handicap (1400m) in Newcastle on March 21 was also a viable target.
“I've got options but short term they're three possibilities, just depending on how the horse is,” Worthington said.
“Whatever way we go I'll let Sainthood tell me that, I'm dictated by him.
“The difference this prep for me is I'm keeping him fresh.
“In the past he's trialled like a bomb, first-up raced like wow this is going to be a great prep and then he starts to look like he plods.
“Generally he's a horse that's had a bit of low-grade general bone soreness.
“To try and keep ahead of that so we don't get to that point, I've been very conscious of keeping him fresh - something a bit more user-friendly.
“I think he's a horse who'll appreciate being kept a little fresh. What comes with that is that there's a lot of improvement there [after Saturday].”
