Rosebud a potential pipe-opener for Sydney fillies
Cigar Flick and Fire Lane nominated for $200,000 feature at Rosehill
Fire Lane (Hellbent) is no certainty to resume in The Rosebud (Listed, 1100m), while the promising Cigar Flick (Churchill) will take race fitness into Saturday’s feature three-year-old race, one which will likely determine the immediate future of the two fillies.
The Darley Princess Series, which culminates in the Flight Stakes (Gr 1, 1600m), could be the end goal for the Chris Waller-trained, Ingham Racing-bred Cigar Flick, but rival trainer Brad Widdup says his filly Fire Lane is unlikely to be tested beyond 1200 metres this spring.
The duo is among 15 nominations – eight colts and geldings and seven fillies – for this weekend’s $200,000 Sydney feature race at Rosehill. Highly talented colts The Instructor (Russian Revolution), Introducing (Trapeze Artist) and Griff (Trapeze Artist) could all resume.
Widdup yesterday said it was his intention to accept with Fire Lane, twice a winner at two who was also stakes performed, in The Rosebud, but he also suggested that the Silver Shadow Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m) at Randwick on Saturday week also loomed as a potential starting point for the sprinting daughter of Yarraman’s Hellbent (I Am Invincible).
The San Domenico Stakes (Gr 3, 1100m) on August 26, back at Rosehill, is another alternative fresh-up option for the BK Racing and Breeding-owned Fire Lane, who finished fifth behind Introducing in a Rosehill barrier trial on July 21 before finishing runner-up to the Chris Waller-trained Olentia (Zoustar) at Canterbury last week.
“It was a little bit hard to get a guide on her last trial because it was an open trial against four-year-olds and she was trialling against one of Waller’s who looks pretty smart, but, look, she was good and the jockey [Robbie Dolan] was happy,” Widdup told ANZ Bloodstock News.
“She galloped this morning, so she’s on song for Saturday if she draws well and, if not, we’ll probably wait.”
Riesling Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m) placed Cigar Flick, meanwhile, comes into The Rosebud on the back of a narrow first-up win at Randwick over the 1100-metre distance on July 8, prompting Waller to bide his time ahead of the Sydney three-year-old fillies stakes races.
“The thinking is, she may head to the Princess Series with her without having any particular goal set in stone,” part-owner Debbie Kepitis said yesterday.
“There’s a nice progression through the fillies races at this time of year.”
Waller has twice won the Flight Stakes, firstly with Funstar (Adelaide) in 2019 and last year with Zougotcha (Zoustar), who used the Silver Shadow Stakes as her first-up run as a three-year-old.
Cigar Flick, by Coolmore shuttler Churchill (Galileo), is the first foal out of Palmateer (Fastnet Rock), a city-winning half-sister to the Inghams’ Waller-trained Vinery Stud Stakes (Gr 1, 2000m) winner Fangirl (Sebring).
“Palmateer is a beautiful little mare out of Little Surfer Girl. She never got to the heights that we hoped she would, but she has produced a really nice horse in Cigar Flick,” Kepitis said.
“She is due at the end of the month to Street Boss, so hopefully we will have a nice little foal as a result of that mating.”
Cigar Flick may have the scope to target the Princess Series, but Fire Lane is an out-and-out sprinter, according to Widdup, which could open up options south of the border.
“She does seem a little bit more relaxed this time through. Hopefully that maturity happens and she can get that little bit further, but I think 1200 [metres] will pull her up, for sure,” he said.
“Obviously there’s the Moir [Stakes] and things like that, but that’s pie in the sky stuff at this stage, so we’ll just see what happens.”