WHEN you’re in a 1000m dash for cash there’s not a lot of margin for error – even when scratchings gut the field to just six starters.
You really have to get everything right to get the win.
Which is exactly what Swan Hill jockey Harry Coffey did on Tuesday with odds-on favourite Kensington Diva, scratched from last week’s turf meeting at Ballarat for this week’s first outing on its synthetic track.
It was a textbook performance.
Even trainer Tony McEvoy agreed the ride was the difference in the outcome of the $27,000 Global Turf Maiden Plate, giving his three-year-old filly her first win in five starts.
Coffey jumped well, stayed out of trouble and then slotted into the best cover of the race until the field turned for home, when he launched off the frontrunners and took control.
He said he had always thought during the running they were going to win.
“I’ve been trialling her a few times – including all three this prep – and I’ve been keen to go wherever she is going to run, so when I got this lovely passage throughout, I thought she would be pretty hard to beat,” Coffey said.
“Although Tom Dabernig’s horse Call To Glory, with Will Price on it, really fought on hard and my girl just failed to fully put it away, to that horse’s credit it ran really well.
“To me today, she just felt like next time, maybe over a bit further, she might a bit more dynamic.”
Coffey said everyone would also need to be a bit mindful because Kensington Diva – which he has ridden in four of her five starts – was the best horse, however “it probably exposed her fairly early in the straight”.
“And she only seems to have a short, sharp turn of foot, so going up in distance I’ll have to remember that next time,” Coffey said.
“Coming back to scale she was pretty clean winded, and the team has done a good job with her, but because she’s just a bit naughty in the gates she’s been a while coming to the races this time around.
“She’s pretty fast usually, but with a few trials and her barrier manners being a bit ordinary, it might have just taken the edge off her today and she was pretty easy to ride.
“She pulled up pretty well and it makes the job easier when they’re doing everything right.”
