It’s been 21 years since veteran Heathcote trainer Bob Douglas celebrated Group 1 glory at Wentworth Park with Golden Easter Egg hero Carlisle Jack.
But the more things change, the more they stay the same – as far as feature race box draws go for Douglas at the Sydney venue.
Grand sprinter Carlisle Jack had to overcome box five in both heat and semi-final of the 2002 Easter Egg, before claiming his career-defining final victory from the four alley.
Two decades later, draws have been similarly unkind to Saturday night’s G1 National Futurity finalist, Baby Jaycee.
“She’s a miniature Carlisle Jack. I don’t know whether she’s as quick as he was, but she’s as tough as him.”
Baby Jaycee, winner of 13 of her 23 starts and runner-up in the G2 Sandown Laurels last month, exited box five in her 29.92sec heat victory last Friday night and has drawn the extreme outside for the $75,000 to-the-winner female age feature.
“I’m not happy with the draw,” Douglas conceded.
“Eight isn’t a great draw at Wenty. If she’d drawn ‘the red’, she would’ve taken a power of beating.
“When Carlisle Jack went up for the Easter Egg, I didn’t give him any chance when he drew box five the first week. Then I didn’t give him a chance the next week when he drew five again. He won both weeks and then won the final from box four. He did it the hard way.
“It was the same story when I took Carlisle Jack over to Adelaide for the Cup. He drew box five in the Interstate Challenge (second), five in his Adelaide Cup heat (won) and then five in the final too (runner-up)!”
WATCH: BABY JAYCEE (B5) wins her heat of the Group 1 National Futurity in 29.92sec.
On a positive note, drawing poorly for interstate features isn’t the only trait Baby Jaycee shares with Carlisle Jack, an eight-time G1 finalist.
“She’s a miniature Carlisle Jack,” Douglas said.
“I don’t know whether she’s as quick as he was, but she’s as tough as him.
“Carlisle Jack was a genuine Group dog. He made 21 consecutive finals and 23 out of 24. The only one he missed was the Australian Cup.
“Baby Jaycee never surrenders and that puts her right in anything. And when they come at her, she kicks.”
Baby Jaycee, a daughter of Bernardo and Leprechaun Storm that turned two on January 1, was having her second start at Wentworth Park when winning her Futurity heat at $1.90, having run a close third on debut on December 21.
While Baby Jaycee’s time was more than competitive with the other three heat winners – Wyndra All Class (29.88sec), Mortified (29.91sec) and Victa Marli (30.11sec) – Douglas’ lofty opinion of the youngster had him expecting more.
“I was disappointed, to be honest with you,” he said candidly.
“I expected her to run 29.60sec. Maybe I was expecting too much, but she’s run basically the same time as her first start at Wentworth Park (29.90sec).
“She ran third that night after blowing the turn. It was an enormous run and I thought she’d find four or five lengths on it. I thought she’d go better.
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“Victa Damian went eight lengths quicker in a Derby heat on the same night. I know he’s a hot young dog, but I couldn’t see him beating Baby Jaycee by eight lengths.
“So we’re looking for that four or five lengths that went missing. We’ll be trying hard to find it because it’s worth ’75 large’ if we can!”
Despite Douglas’ concerns with Baby Jaycee’s draw, from where she’s interestingly unbeaten in two career appearances, albeit on one-turn tracks at Shepparton and Horsham, Baby Jaycee is Sportsbet’s $3.50 second elect, with local Mortified (box 1) $2.20 favourite.
“She’s got to begin to put herself in the race, that’s the key to it,” he said.
“But I wouldn’t be swapping her for anything else in the race.”
