Te Rapa racing: Prowess trainers look to Dionysus as show must go on

Dionysus will be in action in today’s $140,000 SkyCity Hamilton Waikato Cup at Te Rapa.

Roger James has been training top racehorses long enough to know the show must go on even if the star is missing.

So he and training partner Robert Wellwood will have their chins up at Te Rapa today just days after they were stunned to have to retire their stable star Prowess.

The wonderful mare will eventually head to the broodmare paddock after she was found to have hoof issues akin to laminitis, even though she wasn’t showing the signs of soreness that usually signal the degenerative hoof disease.

“When she was transported to the vets on Wednesday both Robert and I were shocked how good she looked and how sound she presented,” says James.

“We looked at each other and said if she was starting a group 1 campaign looking this good you’d be happy.

“It is a real blow, a hard one to take, but now we hope it all settles down and eventually she can have a successful broodmare career.”

The trainers also realise they are lucky to have plenty of other serious horses to go on with, including Dionysus in today’s $140,000 SkyCity Hamilton Waikato Cup at Te Rapa.

The now 6-year-old was one of our staying finds of the summer last year and finished second in this race before winning the Queen Elizabeth Cup at Te Rapa on New Year’s Day.

James says he is back in that same form now,

“He is really where he needs to be,” he told the Herald.

“He is well in himself, racing well and most importantly only has to carry 53kg and gets Warren [Kennedy] on his back.

“So while these races are never easy to win, we are going in confident.”

That 53kg weight has proven to be the sweet spot in New Zealand’s biggest handicap staying events in recent years and it gives Kennedy an array of options from barrier 3 as he can afford to be aggressive if he wants with such a light weight.

His chances received a huge boost yesterday when early favourite Aromatic was scratched, meaning Dionysus moved to $3.60 on Wednesday to $1.90 last night and is clearly the horse to beat.

The Cup may be the signature race of the day but there is just as much intrigue around the J Swap Sprint and the group 2 Cal Isuzu Stakes for the mares.

The mares’ feature may end up being a class shootout between Campionessa and Pearl Of Alsace, who are favoured by the weight-for-age scale.

The J Swap has brought together an eclectic bunch evidenced by the lack of winning form in the race as plenty of them have queries over their latest efforts or general consistency.

Two of the less exposed highlights of the day will be the open race, a hot juvenile dash, and the clash of stablemates Tokyo Tycoon and Quintessa, who started the spring as favourites for the 2000 and 1000 Guineas respectively but both ultimately missed those classics and resume today.

Te Rapa isn’t the sole black type focus of the day, with Trentham hosting the $100,000 Lawnmaster Eulogy Stakes over 1600m.

And there are two major Australian highlights tonight, with all-time great Damien Oliver having his last ever ride in a race named in his honour in his hometown of Perth.

Also, the Inter Dominion Pacing and Trotting Finals will be run at Albion Park, the pacing final earlier than usual at 9.30pm (NZ time) as Racing Queensland tries to lure punters tuning into Sky Racing for the Oliver farewell race.

Michael Guerin wrote his first nationally published racing articles while still in school and started writing about horse racing and the gambling industry for the Herald as a 20-year-old in 1990. He became the Herald’s Racing Editor in 1995 and covers the world’s biggest horse racing carnivals.