By Ainsley Walters, Staff ReporterPERCY HUSSEY's MICHELKA returns off a near 10-month lay-up raring to get it on in tomorrow afternoon's first Super Six event, the 1000-metre round seventh race.
Missing since last November, a week after Superstakes Day, the four-year-old filly has been blazing the exercise track in the mornings and gets a real gift returning among Overnight Allowance runners.
Having not won a race in more than a year has benefitted MICHELKA, allowing the speedy filly to make her 2003 debut a couple classes lower than the Grade I company she kept when chasing I'MSATISFIED to the final furlong of the Red Stripe Caribbean Sprint last November.
MICHELKA looks race-ready, zipping 1:00.2 last week Friday on the round and should outclass rivals back to the wire.
Next up, COQUETTE came out of hiding last month but got her head knocked off by a fellow longshot, BLAZING SILVER at 12-1. The seven-year-old mare returns in a similar conditional $140,000 Claiming race at 1400 metres in the eighth and has the best form to recommend.
SHAHID is what the railbirds like to call "a handicap certainty" in the co-feature, the Seek Trophy at a mile in the ninth.
Running with 55.0 kilos at 1700 metres mid-July, the four-year-old colt was used-up early trying to chase 51.0 kilos REJECT off the lead and ran big right to the final furlong where he was only a length off before the weight took toll.
Returning with 50.0 kilos, apprentice Garfield Morgan's claiming four, SHAHID has nothing to fear from VIGILANTE and ELEGANCE, who ran on to get the better of him inside the final furlong.
Richie Todd's SIREN, a disqualified winner on a $200,000 tag mid-month, should get his revenge in the 10th at 1000 metres straight. SIREN again faces DIGITAL, who benefitted from his disqualification before winning Saturday, along with THAT'S GOLD, the horse who he impeded.
However, the real danger to Todd's charge in the quick sprint is the down-in-class pair of STRAIGHT SIX and KING'S HIGHWAY, both drawn out wide under the stands.
Take ROYAL RUN in the 1820-metre Nigel B. Nunes Memorial Trophy. The four-year-old gelding's main threat must of course be big, bad MENUDO, who has been eased in the weights.
MENUDO returns seven pounds lighter than when he finished three lengths behind disqualified ROYAL RUN in the Prime Minister's Stakes on Independence Day.
ROYAL RUN now has those seven pounds but the Wayne DaCosta-trained runner is in fine fettle. Plus, MENUDO is only two pounds lighter than mid-July when he was five lengths behind ROYAL RUN in the Viceroy Trophy. ROYAL RUN has only gone up five pounds on that effort.
Close those bets with STARLIGHT TIME in the 1200-metre 12th race. The five-year-old grey ran a blinder in defeat last Saturday in a competitive event at 1700 metres. The distance has been slashed, which STARLIGHT TIME won't mind and he'll be right up in the pace with apprentice Morgan's four-kilo claim.
