Gold Circle Pty (Ltd)

Today's Racing :

Ramsden to set the record straight

Brendan Pather
Joey Ramsden has been the king of Durbanville recently with eight winners and 13 placed runners over the last three meetings at the country course. His stable seem determined to make the best of this run and they send out no less than 18 runners for tomorrow’s Durbanville meeting.
Ramsden admitted that his runners have shown a liking for the tight country course in a recent post race interview but the stable surprisingly drew a blank at the midweek meeting. However, they should set the record straight tomorrow.
Their best on the day could be Grail Maiden, an impressive recent winner over 2 000m at the track. The daughter of Galileo showed a lot of promise winning her maiden on debut over 1 200m. The win was doubly impressive; firstly it was over a distance way short of her ideal trip and secondly, Ramsden admittedly does not fully tune up his runners for their debut efforts and the ones that win first time out usually train on to be extremely useful at the least.
Grail Maiden took a while to win her second but that was probably due to the fact that she had to contend with slow run races in her next three outings.
She was running on late on each occasion though and when she finally got a decent gallop in her latest start, she was able to pick them up smartly to win going away. The drop back to 1 800m will not be as much a hindrance as the pace of the race but with the likes of Birthday Girl, Jallad's Queen and Splinter contesting, a true run race is expected.
Grail Maiden looks more than capable of following up off just a three point raise in the ratings and has a much better draw on this occasion. Andrew Fortune gets on for the first time and he should suit this filly.
Grail Maiden's main danger could be another youngster, Cutty Sark, an impressive recent maiden winner from the Justin Snaith yard. The daughter of Fort Wood should enjoy the extra and the decisive turn of foot she showed to put the race to bed last time makes her a realistic danger to the Ramsden runner. She has a good draw and is likely to be the one that Grail Maiden will have to chase down in the straight.An interesting runner is Queen's Pageant from the Shane Humby yard. The five-year-old daughter of Parade Leader took a while to win her maiden but followed up with a good second in her post maiden outing.She was subsequently rested and looked in need of her comeback effort over a mile last month. She was not asked to do much for most of the race but made eye-catching late headway over a trip short of her best and would have come on since. She may need some help from the youngsters to win this one but can make the frame. Ramsden has at least one runner in each race and all of them warrant respect in all bets, especially the exotics.
His strongest hand is in the opener where he saddles four of the ten runners. The stable's two raced runners, Bobby Bear and Vintage Royale, are likely to get most of the attention but there could be some value about one of the first timers, Azeroth. The Western Winter gelding is a full brother to the well performed stakes winners Braggadacio and Fair Maiden and, considering the moderate form on offer, will not have to show much to feature on his debut.

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