Racing: Rioch well worth watching

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Dashing front runner will provide 'wow' factor in his bid to win the Great Northern.

We are in for a treat. Rioch attempting to run the ultimate Great Northern Steeplechase trip at Ellerslie in early September is a breath-taking anticipation.

We haven't seen a dashing front-running steeplechaser for a while.

Certainly not one capable of successfully lasting the dour three trips over the Ellerslie Hill the Great Northern requires.

Yes, Rioch was getting tired towards the end of his runaway $40,000 LJ Hooker Manawatu Steeples victory on Saturday, but only because relative novice Sanuye had fired him up early by contesting the lead.

Left alone, Rioch would probably have been a better horse.

The Great Northern is a stamina-only contest.

They have to be hugely talented to get around that and it's been done.

Ballycastle and Grant Cooskley left them behind a couple of decades back.

Watching Rioch and his dashing leaping will be a treat.

Graeme and Debbie Rogerson have a smart hurdler on their hands in Zenocoin. The 5-year-old achieved a difficult benchmark when he scored his third hurdles win from six starts in the Manawatu ITM Awapuni Hurdles.

This was the best hurdles field Zenocoin had faced and he forged past the opposition in the closing stages with an ease that suggested even stronger company will not bother him.

Levin galloper Pencuri looks to have a bright future after scoring an impressive first-up win in the opening event, a 1400m maiden. Yet another by sire-of-the-moment Zed, Pencuri, in the hands of Chris Johnson, came from well back to surge past his rivals in the straight, which suggested trainers Jane and Norman Wood have a good one on their hands.