Racing: Rain dance at Ellerslie

Craig Thornton hopes Auckland's fickle weather is on its worst behaviour leading into today's races at Ellerslie.

Thornton is preparing his three-year-old filly Electrostatic for the listed Soliloquy Stakes (1400m), and thinks rain-affected ground would be her best chance of winning.

All Electrostatic's five starts have been on wet tracks, resulting in a win and four placings.

She has recorded black type placings at her last two starts, finishing second to Keep The Message in the Ryder Stakes at Otaki on July 29 and second to Chartreuse in the Wanganui Racehorse Owners' Association Stakes (1200m) on September 9.

"From what she's done in her work she'll act on good tracks," Thornton said. "But wet ground would be detrimental to a lot of the others and you've got to have everything going in your favour in racing."

Showers have been forecast for Auckland today but, after a week of unusually hot and dry weather, the track may need a lot of rain to become as soft as Thornton would prefer.

Adding to the Thornton team's woes is a barrier draw of 13 in the 14-horse field.

"It doesn't help, that's for sure," he said. "She does have early speed but I'll leave it up to the jockey to decide how to ride her."

Thornton said Matamata rider Michael Coleman would take the mount after some confusion over the availability of last season's champion jockey Lisa Cropp.

"He rode her for the first time in training this week and was pretty happy. He just said 'leave it up to me'."

The Soliloquy field is full of promising but as yet unproven fillies and even TAB bookies have yet to work out how the race is likely to go.

No filly is shorter than $7, odds shared by Electrostatic, Keep The Passion and Imananabaa, and the Allan Sharrock-trained first starter Whodat Cugat is on the second line at $9 following three trials wins.

-NZPA