KEY POINTS:
The clever punters will be looking for possible ways to get Seachange beaten in tomorrow's $200,000 Waikato Draught Sprint at Te Rapa.
They always do.
If you can, for whatever reason, get a $1.30 or $1.40 chance beaten in a major race the money that can be made on the punt is enormous.
If you can pre-empt a crack in the defence and it comes off, there is no better value in horse racing.
They might look at Seachange's record on the Te Rapa course, which on the surface is not crash hot.
She has had three starts for two beaten performances - in the Foxbridge Plate of 2006 and 2007 - and a half-head victory in a handicap.
But it would be foolish to use that angle - all three races were run on rain-affected footing, on which the great Cambridge mare is never near her best.
Let's face it, there are no negatives for tomorrow outside of those who religiously use the second-up syndrome to decide horses cannot win.
But even that one doesn't stack up too well.
Sure, Seachange had a tough assignment winning the group one Telegraph - you could never say running 1:06.66 for 1200m under 58.5kg was an easy ask for any horse, but as silly as it sounds, she didn't have a gut-buster.
Certainly not as much as those trying vainly to chase her.
And although she hadn't raced for a while - it was 11 weeks between races - that was not like it was after a lengthy winter spell when some horses can be vulnerable with fitness when resuming. The Telegraph result proved Seachange was right up to the mark for that race.
David Walsh rides Gaze, one of the main chances against Seachange tomorrow, and knows what he's up against.
Walsh was about to set off on a horse in training at Cambridge yesterday morning when he caught this flash out of his peripheral vision.
"I thought 'I must find out what that is and see if I can get on it'."
When the "flash" came into closer vision Walsh realised it was Seachange.
"She was flying."
From barrier No 4, it's likely Seachange will sit parked outside the leader, which will probably be Manten.
That's not always ideal for some horses, but Seachange has shown many times it can be a perfect situation for her.
It's a handy launching pad for that long, sustained sprint she can produce, which is better utilised from close to the pace than from the back of the field.
Kay's Awake is an underrated mare, but faces a tough task.
She chased Seachange home bravely in the Telegraph without ever looking likely to get close.
Statistics, not always infallible but a great guide, say Kay's Awake can't beat Seachange this time outside of misadventure.
Kay's Awake goes up 1.5kg from her handicap weight at Trentham and Seachange comes down 2kg. A 3.5kg swing at this level is massive.
The two best finishers in the Telegraph were Dezigna, who goes around in the 2000m Whakanui Stud International, and Irlanda.
Irlanda is certainly going to be suited by the jump to 1400m, but then so, too, is Seachange.
And, like Kay's Awake, Irlanda is 3.5kg worse off against the favourite.
Bad luck beat Phar Lap and Tulloch in feature races, but it's going to take a fair bit of it to scuttle Seachange tomorrow.
