Belardo Boy is on target to defend his crown in next month’s Group 3 Winter Cup (1600m) at Riccarton following his victory in Tuesday’s rescheduled Listed Opunake Cup (1400m) at Hawera.
The topweight was the slowest away in the Taranaki feature and settled towards the rear of the field for jockey Joe Doyle, while race favourite Wessex set a strong tempo up front, opening up several lengths on the rest of the pack during the middle stages of the race.
The pack quickly ate into Wessex’s lead around the final turn, with Doyle navigating Belardo Boy to the extreme outside of the track on the Heavy 10 footing, and the son of Belardo was able to show his class in the concluding stages to draw away and score by two lengths over Spencer, with a further long head back to Gospodin in third.
It was the second consecutive stakes victory for Belardo Boy, who was triumphant in the Listed AGC Training Stakes (1600m) at Wanganui at the start of last month.
He won a trial over 1200m at Foxton in the interim to keep him up to the mark and Latta was pleased with what she saw from her gelding on Tuesday.
“It was a really good win,” she said. “It was a few weeks in between runs but he trialled up nicely with Amber (Riddell) on and pulled up well from that.”
Belardo Boy will now head south to Riccarton next month where he will be vying to defend his crown in the Winter Cup.
“He has had one or two trips down there, he’s a bit older, so it is not like he is having his first trip down there,” Latta said. “Providing he pulls up well, he will go.”
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