Platinum Racing

A WIN IN his hometown Cup with Gunna Happen may go someway to easing the discomfort for Nowra trainer Robert Price who is recovering after horrific injuries suffered recently in a track fall.

The Price trained galloper was well ridden by dimunitive apprentice Sam Clipperton who allowed the gelding to stride along in front throughout and he never really looked like being run down in the feature on the Archer Raceway.

Price suffered the injuries when he was thrown from a youngster on the training track and will be in a brace for severe injuries for quite some time.

TRUMBY KEEPS ROLLING ALONG:

Luke "Trumby" Nolen has without doubt made the step from a good jockey to a top class rider who makes very few mistakes in races and he continued his low flying with another three winners at yesterday's feature race meeting in Doomben.

Despite the fact that Nolen, while apprenticed in the Victorian high country at Mansfield with Gerald Egan, won a Melbourne apprentice's premiership, his career came to a grinding holt when he came out of his time and he was travelling to meetings like Leeton in the Riverina from his Benalla base to get rides.

A chance link up with trainer Peter Moody has seen one of Australia's most successful jockey-trainer partnerships evolve and last season the duo celebrated their 500th win as a partnership - and many more have been added on to that tally since.

They have had multiple Gr 1 successes with Black Caviar, Headway, Markus Maximus, Avenue, Reward For Effort, Typhoon Tracy etc and hasve established themselves as big tiume carnival performers - irrespective of where the carnival is.

Luck is a fortune in racing but luck does not last long if you do not do the work. Nolen has honed his craft beautifully and is now a jockey that would hold his own anywhere in the world.

He proved that last year when he race at Ascot in the UK in the Shergar Wold Jockey Series.

He is just a superstar.

BEADED A MIGHTY MIDGET:

It is not hard to see why Beaded is Darley's trainer Peter Snowden's favourite horse. She is an absolute corker and her win in yesterday's Gr 1 Doomben 10,000 (1350m) was certainly one of the most deserved for a very long time.

It was her maiden Gr 1 success (but she should have won the Swettenham in Adelaide recently when Mark Zahra turned in a so-so ride on the mare.

This tiny daughter of Lonhro is all heart and these type of horses have a habit of endearing themselves to horsepeople. Brave horses are few and far between and Beaded is all guts.

OUR CAST OFF WINS:

Destiny Express - a horse that Platinum Racing had a 10% share in via a Triple Crown Syndicate - scored a very easy win in a Class B race at Mt Isa in north western Queensland yesterday with former Albnury jockey Rodney Sue San in the saddle.

The horse was prepared for us by Chris Waller and was very well bred, being by Testa Rossa out of Shoot The Stars, but he developed wind problems and the general concensus of the syndicate shareholders was to sell the horse rather than operate on him and keep him.

BEADMAN AND MORE DOMINATE LAST FEATURE RACE DAY:

The Champion and Chater Cup (2400m) was the final Gr 1 race for the season in Hong Kong today and expat Aussie trainer John Moore continued his unbelievable run in big races when he won the race with ther favourite, Mighty High, with Darren Beadman in the saddle.

Moore (usually with Beadman) has knocked up winning feature races this season) and Mighty High won in a driving finish from last year's winner Mr Medici (Gerald Mosse) with another Moore trained runner, champion Viva Pataca (Weichong Marwing) beaten just over three lengths into third place.

It was Viva Pataca's sixth attempt at winning the race and the nine-year-oild proved just what a freak racehorse he is - as his third took his tally to three wins and three placings in the feature.

Moore topped off a remarkable day again by taking out the Gr 3 sprint race with Dim Sum, again ridden by Beadman, which staved off a challenge from stablemate Sunny King (Gerald Mosse).

DON'T WANT TO SOUND LIKE GAI....BUT:

We can all remember that tactless and insensitive spray Gai Waterhouse gave Julia Gillard's fashion sense calling it "carnage" when she was standing among the ruins of the horrendous earthquake and tsunami in Japan.

Gai was not wrong to point out the Prime Minister's lack of style - that is fair enough - but it was just not the right time to raise it when she was standing in such devastated surrounds. To have looked like she walked off the front cover of Vogue in those circumstanceswould have looked silly. So Gai got it wrong - as she frequently does when she gobs off when she is suffering from some bout of media attention deficit - usually brought on by a dearth of feature race wins at carnival time!

Her comments came after a pretty bleak AJC Autumn Carnival for the Waterhouse stable so when you have nothing to spruik about may as well pick on someone.

Thankfully my target was not standing in the midst of a human disaster - John Moore - sheesh.

When will this man give up wearing safar suits? Spare me - he has got a squillion, yet he turns up looking like an extra from the Great Gatsby and has the temerity to wear the hideous things to presentations - give me a break!

EDDIE ENJOYS A RIPPER:

Eddie Cassar had a ripper day out at the Tatura meeting in Victoria yesterday when he landed a winning treble. Cassar rose to prominence as the rider of champion sprinter Testa Rossa in the early stages of his career, in fact he was sacked as the hopp after winning the (then) Gr 1 VRC Sires Produce on the horse.

These days Cassar is a valuable work rider and sometimes race rider for the Lloyd and Nick Williams team at Mt Macedon.

ABNORMAL BLOOD TESTS IN SINGAPORE:

Abnormal blood tests for the Nipah virus have prevented the star studden quartet of Presvis, Wigmore Hall, California Memory and Sacred Kingdom from leaving Singapore following their engagements at last week's Singapore International Race Meeting.

Sacred Kingdom, who did not return an abnormality in his blood test has been prevented from leaving because he is stabled with California Memory.

Further blood tests have been carried out and the results of the more definitive tests are due early this week. To date no horse has shown any of the symptoms of having the voirus, elevated temperatures, listlessness, loss of apetite etc.

Visiting international horses in Singapore are stabled in insect proof stables and the head veterinary surgeon of the Singapore Turf Club Dr Berg said that is is not uncommon for abnormalities in the initial test to surface.

FABRE THINKS HE CAN KNOCK OFF THE QUEEN:

Champion French trainer Andre Fabre, who has had 9 attempts at winning the coveted Epsom Derby, and has finished no closer than fifth to date, feels his representative for Friday night's classic, Pour Moi, is his best chance to date of winning the race.

The French ace believes his horse is the testing material for the hot favourite Carlton House, trained by Sir Michael Stoute for Queen Elizabeth II.

Carlton House is currently 6/4 with Pour Moi 6/1 for the Classic.

Ballydoyle's Aiden O'Brien has five horses still in the Derby and he will sit down with his team early this week to decide on how many of these make the trek to Epsom.

FAREWELL YOU OLD FREAK:

As I write this the news has come through that owner Stanley Ho and trainer John Moore have announced that Viva Pataca would be retired after his third in today's Gr 1 Champions and Chater Cup in Hong KOng.

The nine year old has done it all - won a Derby, won at international level, won three Champions and Chaters - and he retires as the greatest ever stakes winner in Hong Kong - having amassed a staggering $83m (HK) - and some change!

What a wonderful racehorse.

AUSSIES HEAD FOR THE UK:

Sprinters Star Witness (Danny O'Brien) and Hinchinbrook (Peter Moody) leave this week to contest the races at Royal Ascot next month.

With Hungarian superstar Overdose, disappointing at his first UK run, Singapore's Rocket Man not going to England, Borderlesscott not running and Sacred Kingdom failing in Singapore and now stranded there with the virus scare - the Kings Stand and Golden Jubilee may well be weaker renewals this year.

There isd little doubt that on their A Game both Aussies are capable sprinters.