KEY POINTS:
Ruud Van Slaats earned most of the kudos in winning last week's $120,000 Breeders Stakes at Pukekohe ... but not all of it.
Culminate pulled in some for herself.
The remarkably consistent mare finished a close third after drawing a very wide gate.
And while the speedy Ruud Van Slaats was comfortable in front dictating at her own tempo, Culminate worked hard for the first 250m to get up and sit outside the eventual winner.
She was the first to challenge Ruud Van Slaats and showed her class by hanging in there all the way down the long Pukekohe run in to be just a long neck and half a length away.
Expect Cuminate to perform on a seven-day back-up when she contests tomorrow's $77,000 group three Eagle Technology Stakes at Ellerslie.
She has only twice been worse than 1-2-3 in 16 career starts - statistics that stamp her as one of the best mares in training.
Taking The Mickey is better than his moderate formline on paper suggests.
He was not far away from Samurai at weight-for-age at Tauranga last start.
Samurai drops 3kg from that race, but Taking The Mickey comes back 4kg.
There is no suggestion Samurai will not manage Ellerslie - he's had one unplaced run on the course - but Taking The Mickey is already a winner at "headquarters".
Fiscal Madness was probably always going to struggle a little resuming over 1600m at weight-for-age at Tauranga.
He was right there with them at the 250m, but his condition, understandably gave out and he wilted to sixth.
It was not a bad effort and with that run behind him he should be more competitive this time.
Avaroadi is probably in career-best form. He ran home strongly out wide to finish second to Samurai at Tauranga and on paper this race looks more suitable.
But the sobering statistic is that from eight starts at Ellerslie Avaroadi has recorded just one minor placing.
Superalloy and Penitentiary are genuine hopes in what will be an interesting race.
