There have been other contributing factors such as increased stakes at home, meaning fewer of the elite New Zealand gallopers, particularly 3-year-olds, have campaigned in Australia, the obvious exception being Savaglee, who was second in the Australian Guineas.
Alabama Lass won a A$500,000 listed race last month while others of that crop include Willydoit, who took on the Australian Derby last Saturday, again almost as an afterthought, and despite a brave fourth was well beaten.
It hasn’t been all one-way traffic, with Damask Rose beating the Australian challenge in the NZB Kiwi at Ellerslie, but the Australian 3-year-old filly crop looks deeper than ours so Leica Lucy might need to do something special to triumph again today.
While Leica Lucy is a proven 2400m winner, which always helps in a Derby or Oaks, today’s race is something of an afterthought for her and Waller only confirmed she would be starting on Tuesday.
She has raced, and won, at black-type level every month since December so must be coming to the end of her campaign, whereas the Australians in today’s Oaks have had the opportunity to race in their spring classics, spell and return for this campaign.
The best example of that is today’s favourite, Treasurethe Moment, who won the VRC Oaks on November 7 and then didn’t race again until February 22, winning all three races this campaign on her way to today’s Grand Final.
She looks a special filly and while Leica Lucy may not have found her ceiling yet, Treasurethe Moment’s might be even higher.
So you have the best staying filly from each country but one who has been set for this Oaks and the other for who it is a bonus after having only recently joined a new stable.
That has to give a significant advantage to Treasurethe Moment, especially if rain forecast for Friday night comes as she has more winning form on softer tracks than Leica Lucy.
The irony is that neither Oaks favourite may even be the best 3-year-old filly heading to Randwick on a superstar second day of The Championships.
That honour may sit with unbeaten filly Autumn Glow (Round 5, No 8) who takes on the boys in the A$1m Arrowfield Sprint, fitting as she is owned by the race sponsor John Messara.
The Randwick card is stacked, with Via Sistina favoured over Dubai Honour in the A$5m Queen Elizabeth Stakes as she tries to win her seventh Group 1 of the season.
The race has international depth with only three of the 14 runners having started their careers in Australia.
Another female star in Fangirl adds to McDonald’s stunning book of rides in the A$1m Queen of the Turf, which will also be the last race in the career of NZ mare Atishu.
The card is so packed with glamour gallopers that punters could almost overlook today being the 160th running of the A$2m Sydney Cup, which features last-start Auckland Cup runner-up Tajanis.
Closer to home, Trentham hosts the Hawke’s Bay Cup as the Hastings track remains out of action, while Riccarton has one of its biggest non-carnival days of the season highlighted by the $350,000 TAB Southern Alps Final for South Island-trained gallopers.
Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s Racing Editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.
