McDonald hopes history is on Angel Capital’s side in Guineas
Harry Angel colt ready to step out to a mile in Saturday’s Caulfield’s stallion-making Classic
Clinton McDonald is confident his burgeoning star colt Angel Capital (Harry Angel) is good enough to win Saturday’s stallion-making Caulfield Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m), but is hoping a little history and nostalgia can help him along the way.
To attain glory in one of Australia’s great stallion-makers, Angel Capital – the subject of feelers from a couple of studs already – will have to defeat the intimidating figure of Broadsiding (Too Darn Hot), the raging $1.55 favourite, the three-time Group 1 winner, and a Godolphin weapon looking potentially as good as the royal blue empire’s recent pin-up boy Anamoe (Street Boss).
Angel Capital, winner of three from five including the Caulfield Guineas Prelude (Gr 3, 1400m) most recently on September 21, sits next in the market at $8, in a compact field of nine colts and two geldings.
A sizeable purchase, for the Inglis Premier Yearling Sale, at $400,000, Angel Capital will be stepping up to 1600 metres for the first time, whereas Broadsiding has already won thrice over the trip, including in elite company in Randwick’s Champagne Stakes (Gr 1, 1600m) and Eagle Farm’s JJ Atkins (Gr 1, 1600m) as a two-year-old.
While McDonald has no fears about his colt handling the distance, he is aware of the huge challenge of toppling Broadsiding, but is hopeful Caulfield’s history as a graveyard for northerners will help.
Broadsiding’s only anti-clockwise run came on debut when fourth in an unsuitably short 1100-metre maiden at the roomy Ballarat track in February, before his last seven outings going right-handed in Sydney, Newcastle and Brisbane.
McDonald hopes Broadsiding finds Caulfield as tricky as some other northern heroes in the past.
The great Kingston Town (Bletchingly) famously came unstuck there in his first two Melbourne runs in the spring of 1979 to be promptly declared a “Sydney champion” by his southern critics, running third at even money in the Caulfield Guineas before coming fourth in the Caulfield Cup (Gr 1, 2400m).
Indeed, ‘The King’ returned a year later to run second as a 2-1 on favourite in the Caulfield Stakes (Gr 1, 2000m), and third in the Caulfield Cup, also as favourite.
It wasn’t until his fifth and sixth (and last) visits, as an older and more seasoned horse, that he was able to slay the curse, with back-to-back victories in the Caulfield Stakes of 1981 and 1982, albeit in fields of only six and eight.
Kingston Town of course showed he wasn’t averse to going left-handed per se by winning three Cox Plates (Gr 1, 2040m) at Moonee Valley. Yet in that first Caulfield Cup, he chased home the classy winner and stablemate Mighty Kingdom (Plant Kingdom), whom he’d beaten by four lengths in Randwick’s Spring Champion Stakes (Gr 1, 2000m) two weeks earlier.
The King’s rider Malcolm Johnson once provided some telling insights which may boost McDonald’s hopes of upsetting the long-striding Broadsiding.
“The black horse could get around Moonee Valley but just couldn’t handle the camber at Caulfield,” Johnston said in a 2012 interview.
“Mighty Kingdom? He loved the circuit. Kingston Town was a bigger strider. Mighty Kingdom was smaller, not as much ability as the black horse but jumped on his right leg in Melbourne all the time.
“I could just never get the black horse to do it properly. He was an adaptable bastard but not down there. He was the most stand-out case regarding Caulfield. I rode a few that never handled it either.”
Aside from that black horse, McDonald more freshly remembers how the outstanding So You Think (High Chaparral) had his first look at Caulfield as a young colt and managed only fifth in the Guineas of 2009.
He showed his star quality anti-clockwise at his next start with his demoralising all-the-way win in the Cox Plate (Gr 1, 2040m), before running second in the Melbourne Cup (Gr 1, 3200m).
McDonald also has particularly vivid memories of the 2008 Guineas triumph of Weekend Hussler (Hussonet). It was the gelding’s first race at Caulfield in his fifth start, following wins at Sandown (twice) and Cranbourne, but he was well familiar with the track since he was trained there by McDonald’s father Ross.
“Hopefully Caulfield can prove the graveyard for Broadsiding that it’s been in the past for some top horses,” McDonald told ANZ.
“It’s been a tricky track for northern horses in the past. So You Think got beaten, and there’s been plenty of others come to Caulfield and get beaten.
“There’s also been plenty come down and win, but we’ll go with the first one, and hopefully it’s not easy for Broadsiding.”
McDonald also hopes his colt has had the preferred preparation, with two lead-up runs and his last being three weeks ago. Broadsiding resumed by taking Rosehill’s Golden Rose (Gr 1, 1400m) two weeks ago.
“The favourite’s second-up, and is going from 1400 to 1600 with just two weeks in between,” he said.
But aside from a little schadenfreude towards the opposition, McDonald has much reason to believe in Angel Capital on his own merits, saying his preparation had been flawless, especially his powerful burst along the fence to claim the Guineas Prelude by 0.46 lengths.
“He’s come on great since his last run, he’s in a great shape, looks terrific and we’re very pleased with him,” he said.
“The Prelude was a great win. He showed good tenacity, hit the line strongly, so I’ve got no worries about him getting the mile.
“He’s had three weeks since that run, which is a gap I really like. We’ve had a few weeks to get him ready for Saturday, and we feel he’s on top of his game.
“Obviously, it’s a big job ahead of us to try to knock off the favourite as we all know, but we think he’s good enough to be able to do that.
“It’s our home track. We’ve been there and won. We’re just hoping we can get the breaks we need and get the luck that we need.
“Broadsiding is a good horse; he’s a very good horse. He’s obviously the three-year-old of the moment, but our colt’s also a very good colt, and we expect him to run really well.”
The Melbourne weather forecast, albeit harder to get right than a Pick 6, leans in Angel Capital’s favour, with no rain forecast. Broadsiding is unbeaten on soft and heavy going, and has won one from four on good. Angel Capital has won both his starts on good, and one from three on soft.
“We want a good track. If it can get to fast, even better,” said McDonald, reporting some interest had been shown in his colt from the stud world, which will have to wait.
“We’ve had a couple of people call but we’re not really doing anything until after the Guineas at this stage. We want to concentrate on that. The owners are keen to keep racing him, and we’ll worry about that other stuff later on.”
As for nostalgia, McDonald will be reminded of the outstanding Weekend Hussler even before the jump, thanks to a gear change for Angel Capital: the application at the rear of brushing boots – which McDonald knows by a different name.
“He nicked himself through the tape last start, so we’ve put the old Hussler boots on him,” he said. “Weekend Hussler used to wear them. Hopefully it’ll rub off on this bloke.”
McDonald said a drop of 400 metres to another renowned stallion-maker, Flemington’s Coolmore Stud Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m), could be on Angel Capital’s radar post-Guineas.
“That’s the beauty of this horse,” he said. “We think he can be a really good sprinter-miler, and hopefully that shows through on Saturday. The Coolmore’s there as an option for afterwards. We’ll get through Saturday and see what happens.”
Bred by South Australian breeding byword David Peacock, and bought by long-term McDonald clients Upper Bloodstock and Gregory Ho from Mill Park Stud’s Premier draft, Angel Capital is the third stakes winner from Bahamas (Teofilo). He follows half-siblings Berkeley Square (Territories) and Hong Kong’s Senor Toba (Toronado), who’ve won two and three stakes races respectively.
Bahamas only won a maiden but was thrice stakes placed, including a third in Morphettville’s Australasian Oaks (Gr 1, 2000m). Her colt by Blue Point (Shamardal) sold from Mill Park’s draft to Lucky Owners P.L. for $300,000 at Inglis Easter this year. And after a Pinatubo (Shamardal) foal died after birth last year, she’s now in foal to Blue Point again.
The Guineas also features Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott’s China Horse Club-Newgate colt Mayfair (Fastnet Rock), an $11 third-favourite following his 0.33 length last-start third in Broadsiding’s Golden Rose, and a 0.25 length second to subsequent Group 1 winner Lady Shenandoah (Snitzel) in the Ming Dynasty Quality (Gr 3, 1400m), also at Rosehill.
Chris Waller’s Coolmore and partners colt Private Life (Written Tycoon), fourth in the Guineas prelude, was at $13 on Tuesday, alongside Lindsay Park’s Evaporate (Per Incanto), who’s out for five wins in succession after taking Moonee Valley’s Stutt Stakes (Gr 2, 1600m) last start.