KEY POINTS:
Ross Elliot hopes he can get away with something with Zilzie in today's $50,000 Cambridge Lodge Breeders Stakes at Tauherenikau.
And the Cambridge trainer thinks he can.
Elliot knows today's 1600m distance will quickly become too short for his staying oriented mare, but believes he has left sufficient freshness in her to cope with a sharp race.
To assist that Elliot has done little in training with Zilzie since her solid first-up third to Belthazar at Avondale on January 20.
That race was Zilzie's first since her gallant victory over Samurai and Cedar Manor in the $70,000 First Sovereign Trust Rotorua Challenge in mid-October.
Elliot has always had a very high opinion of his four-from-eight mare and although he says he's not sure what she will be aimed at beyond today, it's short odds she will end up campaigning in Queensland where she is owned.
Zilzie was headed to last year's Queensland Oaks before her final lead-up race at Te Rapa was washed away by a torrential downpour.
She showed with her good finish at Avondale that she has spelled well and Lisa Cropp, who rode her at Rotorua, should have her steaming at the leaders in the closing 200m.
Fellow Cambridge mare Molta is in with a big shout.
From last in the early running she finished fourth, four lengths from Sir Slick, in the group one Thorndon Mile at Trentham last start. The time before she lost her rider at the start of the Gasmate Stakes at Te Rapa.
At level weights this looks marginally easier for Molta than either of those assignments.
Owner Sam Kelt could do with a change of luck and class mare Lilakyn is not an impossible chance to provide it.
Lilakyn is better known as a stayer, but three of her seven wins have been at this 1600m distance and she seems to throw in good efforts when she's fresh from a break.
Thee Auld Hussie is a value trifecta runner.
It wasn't a bad effort when sixth behind Bonjour at Awapuni, a fresh-up performance that followed a Queensland winter campaign last year.
* Roger James could get another win with Nova at the dual code meeting at Avondale today.
Nova has been freshened since finishing second to Smarty Pants on a dead track at Tauranga on January second. She seems better suited to a firm surface and she poses a threat to Mark Walker's pair, Spring Dancer and Show Lad.
