AMELIA'S REASON DRAWS WIDE.....AGAIN!!!!

AMELIA'S REASON, who will be one of the favourites in Saturday's Sires Produce Stakes, has again drawn a wide barrier in what is a very good field and a difficult race to win. Nine of the fifteen nominations started in the recent Karrakatta Plate and two of the other runners are last start winners, making this a very even and tough race with the two year olds stepping up to 1400m for the first time.

AMELIA'S REASON will be having his fifth lifetime start and once again he has drawn an awkward barrier. The horse drew the outside barrier 10/10 at his first start in a race, then drew 9/11 when he won the Magic Millions Stakes at his second start. The horse then drew 6/7 when he got tangled up in the barrier before drawing 14/15 in the Karrakatta Plate. This weekend he has drawn 13/15 but hopefully he may come in a couple with scratchings.

Wide barriers at the 1400m start have traditionally been an impossible hurdle to overcome so there is no doubt that the horse has the job ahead of him. I am happy with where he is at as the horse prepares for what is likely to be his last start for this preparation. The horse has been in work for quite a long time considering he had his first trial in mid October last year followed by his first race start at the end of October. He has basically only had freshen ups between races since then however he is probably in the best condition of his short career right at the moment.

Unlike the two weeks leading up to the Karrakatta Plate where we were doing our best to get him to the races after he injured himself the start before, the past two weeks have been fairly incident free and a lot easier for the horse to deal with. I expect the race to be a very good guide to the future for most of these horses and it is very rare that a poor quality horse wins the Sires Produce. I can only hope that my horse is good enough and goes on to reach the heights of one of my previous Sires winners, HARDRADA. Here's hoping!