Stradbroke Handicap hopeful Dawn Passage heads up the nominations for the 2020 Group 3 $125,000 Fred Best Classic (1350m) at Doomben on Saturday.
Dawn Passage, above, heads up the nominations for the 2020 Fred Best Classic at Doomben. Photo by Steve Hart.
The winner of the Fred Best Classic for the three year olds is exempt from the ballot for the Group 1 $350,000 The Stradbroke Handicap (1400m) at Eagle Farm the following Saturday and co-trainers Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott are hoping that Dawn Passage can secure a place in Queensland’s premier sprint race.
“We are realistic in that if we want to go to the Stradbroke then it (the Fred Best) is probably the path we will have to take,” co-trainer Adrian Bott told Racenet.
“He may have to win the Fred Best to get into the Straddy.”
“The owners were a bit concerned about the back-up but I said I wouldn’t be worried, it is probably actually a positive,” Bott said.
“We have had great success in doing it and we wouldn’t be afraid to do it if it was necessary.
“If it was going to be detrimental to his chances in the Straddy, well, then he just wouldn’t be there, full-stop.
“We wouldn’t be afraid of the back-up by any means.”
Dawn Passage is one of twenty-four three year olds nominated for the Fred Best Classic and is currently thirty-seventh in the order of entry for the Stradbroke Handicap.
Early betting at Ladbrokes.com.au for the Fred Best Classic has Dawn Passage as the $3.30 favourite while in Stradbroke Handicap markets, the Dawn Approach colt is the second pick at $7 behind last year’s winner Trekking at $6.
Dawn Passage has been racing in dynamic form with wins at his last two starts at Rosehill in the Group 3 $160,000 Hawkesbury Guineas (1400m) on Anzac Day followed by a win in the $200,000 Inglis 3yo Guineas (1400m) on May 16.
On the second line of betting for the Fred Best Classic at $5 is the Peter and Paul Snowden trained Hightail who is coming off a last start win in the Group 3 $125,000 Brandons Gold Coast Guineas (1200m) at the Gold Coast on May 16.
Early betting for the Fred Best Classic at Ladbrokes.com.au: $3.30 Dawn Passage, $5 Hightail, $6 Grand Piano, $7 Exhilarates, $10 The Odyssey, $11 Command’N’Conquer, $12 Subpoenaed, $14 Petronius, $15 Bellevue Hill, $17 Scathing, Stampe, $26 Dynamic Thinker, Garibaldi, Ready Babe, Shadow Of Time, $31 Fisticuffs, Scout, Star Of Michelin, $51 The Sinner, $67 Lady Appleton, Genzai The Wolf, $101 Inching Closer, $151 Buzzer Beater, The Power Of One.
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