POSEIDON ADVENTURE
Confidence increasing as challengers line up to take on boom colt Growing Empire
Calvin McEvoy, Peter Snowden and Adrian Bott will send three colts out against Growing Empire (Zoustar) in Saturday’s Poseidon Stakes (Listed, 1100m), with all three having cause for optimism about toppling the boom three-year-old at Flemington.
Growing Empire was on Wednesday a firm $1.80 favourite – and the only runner of the 13 under double figures – following his slashing first-up win in Caulfield’s McNeil Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) on August 31, a race with a proven record for producing topliners.
Easing down to score by 1.3 lengths, Ciaron Maher and Yulong’s colt made it three wins from four starts, and is now a $4 favourite for the stallion-making Coolmore Stud Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) at Flemington on November 2, ahead of Storm Boy (Justify) at $6.
While bookmakers have framed the Listed Poseidon as a one-horse race, Growing Empire confronts a tougher field of three-year-old males, slightly ironically, than he beat in the Group 3 McNeil.
Team McEvoy will start the underrated Dublin Down (Exceedance), a $15 chance. Snowden has the potentially exciting High Octane (Deep Field), a $10 equal second favourite, while Bott and Gai Waterhouse send Prost (Snitzel) south for the first time. With blinkers applied for his first-up run, the Canonbury Stakes (Gr 3, 1100m) winner was at $23 on Wednesday.
If there is one rival camp with more cause for confidence than the others, it would be Team McEvoy with Dublin Down, who has barrier ten for Damian Lane, and comes off a 0.3 length second in an 800-metre Cranbourne barrier trial behind the smart Nadal (Xtravagant).
Dublin Down has had some hard luck stories. He was forced to tackle the Blue Diamond Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) first-up, after requiring surgery for an entrapped epiglottis, and unsurprisingly ran 12th. He then had his first clockwise run and won Rosehill’s Pago Pago Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m), but while he found some support in the Golden Slipper (Gr 1, 1200m), he sat three wide without cover on pace from gate 12, and duly weakened into 11th.
In his first campaign, however, he acquired something most of his rivals this Saturday do not possess: a win up the Flemington straight.
Dublin Down was the stable’s second runner on Cup day in the Maribyrnong Plate (Gr 3, 1000m), but while favourite Blue Statum (Blue Point) veered about late on, Dublin Down looked the consummate professional sticking straight to score by 0.2 lengths.
He’d also debuted over the same course when fourth in the Maribyrnong Trial (Listed, 1000m), and Calvin McEvoy believes this experience will serve him well on Saturday.
Growing Empire, in contrast, will have his first look at the straight after wins at Caulfield, Morphettville and The Valley.
Only two other Poseidon runners have straight experience. Team Corstens and James Harron’s colt Aardvark (Capitalist), a $26 shot, won the Talindert Stakes (Listed, 1100m) in February in his only try, and Mick Price and Michael Kent Jnr’s $11 hope First Settler (Written Tycoon) won a 1000-metre two-year-old handicap there last start on July 20, after scoring at Caulfield on debut.
“Dublin Down has the experience down the straight, and there’s only a couple of horses in the race who have that,” McEvoy told ANZ Bloodstock News.
“That’s very important for young horses. Growing Empire looks a class horse but, first time down the straight, we often see horses get it wrong. I’m not saying he will but we know our horse won’t make any mistakes.
“We’ve drawn in the right part of the track, and he’ll just be ridden wherever he’s comfortable to finish off very strong late. History says being drawn on the outer half is the place to be.
“We’re excited to have him back at the races in what looks a really tough contest.”
McEvoy said he was content for Dublin Down to go in off just one “very good” trial, especially given the timing of the Poseidon as a lead-up to bigger things.
“He looks fantastic, he’s much more mature, he’s got a good attitude for a colt, and we’re hoping he can be a live chance in a Coolmore,” he said.
“We’re hopeful rather than confident for Saturday. The favourite’s got that fitness edge, and has a lot of hype about him. I think we’ll run really nicely and be improved out of it.”
If something can inspire hopes of a Poseidon upset, it could be recent history, with the cliche “good horses’ race” perhaps not one fitting well on this traditional spring campaign-opener since it was shortened by 300 metres in 2019.
Last year’s winner Archo Nacho (Sioux Nation), now in Hong Kong, started at $13. The 2022 victor Buenos Noches (Supido) has won one of the 13 since. Ranch Hand (Fastnet Rock) won at $14 in 2021, has won one of 20 since, and been offloaded by Chris Waller
The exception came with September Run (Exceed And Excel), the subsequent winner of the Coolmore and one other Group 1, who took the Poseidon in 2020 before it was promptly closed off to fillies the year after, as administrators did a little more of their incessant tinkering.
Aside from history, while many trainers will apply blinkers for a maiden straight appearance, Maher in fact took Growing Empire’s off before the McNeil.
One who’ll wear them for the first time on Saturday is Prost. He was one of Tulloch Lodge’s flotilla of two-year-old stars last season, winning the Canonbury then finishing just 1.4 lengths off Storm Boy in the Skyline Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m).
While he didn’t flatter when 13th in the Slipper, before a fifth when stepped up in trip to the Sires’ Produce Stakes (Gr 1, 1400m), co-trainer Bott said he had “matured well” as he embarks on a probably Coolmore campaign. He had also impressed in two barrier trials, the latest a 0.55 length second to Godolphin’s handy Traffic Warden (Street Boss).
Significantly, senior Sydney-based jockey Nash Rawiller has eschewed a possible book of rides at the rich Rosehill meeting to travel to Melbourne to ride Prost, who has gate four. Rawiller has only one other ride on the card, in the last race on $13 shot Suizuro (Real Impact).
“Up the straight is not for all horses. It may be to his liking, but we’ll learn a bit more on Saturday,” Bott told ANZ Bloodstock News.
“We experimented with the blinkers at home and in his latest trial, and they might just assist him first-up over that trip.
“He’s pretty versatile in what we’ve seen from his racing pattern. He’s got tactical speed but, importantly, the horse can settle and take a position as well.
“That versatility will help him adapt up the straight. They can be quite exposed there for the duration of the run, but I think he’ll be strong at the end of a straight 1100 [metres].”
High Octane, who at $1.05 million remains the most expensive yearling by the now resurgent but unfortunately also retired Deep Field (Northern Meteor), could yet get the chance to show his class in a spring of plenty as far as three-year-olds go.
A Newgate, China Horse Club, Go Bloodstock and Trilogy purchase at Inglis Easter, High Octane debuted with an impressive 0.8 length win in the Blue Diamond Preview (C&G) (Listed, 1000m), before a luckless fifth when hopelessly blocked as favourite in the Prelude (C&G) (Gr 3, 1100m).
The robust colt then looked plain as an easing $8 chance when ninth in the Blue Diamond, but Snowden said he was shin sore after the race – on a Good 4 – precipitating his spell rather than a bid for Sydney’s two-year-old riches.
High Octane then resumed with an eye-catching third in Rosehill’s The Rosebud (Listed, 1100m), coming from the back to finish 2.1 lengths off winner Gatsby’s (Snitzel), and has since won an open class Randwick barrier trial over 1045 metres by almost six lengths, on a Good 4.
“I’m happy with him. He’s come on good from his first–up run,” Snowden said of High Octane, who has barrier seven for James McDonald.
“I thought his first-up run was good, when he was hitting the line well. He’s tidied up nicely, he probably wants a little bit further but he’s going well enough.
“I don’t think the straight will worry him. You don’t know until you try, but he’ll be fine. He’s not a hard going horse at all. He’ll sit back and hopefully launch late and do something.”
Snowden said he was unsure whether High Octane’s main spring target would be the Coolmore or the Golden Rose (Gr 1, 1400m) at Rosehill on September 28.