By Matt Markham
There’s no panicking in the Have Faith In Me camp yet despite the New Zealand Trotting Cup favourite starting his campaign with a hop, skip and a jump yesterday at Ashburton.
Last season’s Miracle Mile winner made a hash of his stand start effort at the Ashburton workouts, but was sublime post that mishap, looping the field to lead before holding off the challenges of his high-class stablemates, Lazarus and Smolda.
“He’s a bit fresh today and he panicked when he came up with horses on either side of him,” driver and co-trainer Natalie Rasmussen said.
“It’s a worry, but I’m not real concerned just yet because I think it’s something we can sort out, it will just take a bit of time and practice.
“He went good afterwards though, I was impressed with his effort.”
The stand start has been a bit of an achilles heel for the All Stars camp with Have Faith In Me and his chances of starting in the Cup will rest heavily on getting in right from behind the tape.
“He’s on the unruly, which helps because there aren’t a lot of horses around him which means he doesn’t panic as much.
“But even from there in the Auckland Cup when Tim stepped him he was still a wee way off them and you don’t want to be doing that in a race like the New Zealand Cup.”
Once he settled into his hopples yesterday, Rasmussen wasted no time in sending Have Faith In Me to the front with Lazarus popping out in front of him to secure the trail.
From there it was a procession before they ramped things up from the 800 metres.
Lazarus looked to have the measure of his stable mate a furlong out from the post, but Have Faith In Me rallied strongly to claim the win.
Smolda, who settled last of the four horse heat, worked around to parked at the 400 metre mark and was strong to the line for Tim Williams.
“I was pretty happy with that, he felt good and felt like he really could have stepped if I had wanted him too which is good,” Williams said.
Rasmussen said the trio would return to the trials next week before any plans are set for a race resumption.
“That’s still up in the air a little bit at the moment,” she said.
“Smolda and Have Faith In Me are probably just a little bit more forward than Lazarus
so they could possibly head to the Canterbury Classic.
“But we will trial them again next week and see where we are at, then make the decision.”
Fourth in the heat, not far behind the All Stars trio, was Quick As A Trick.
The Bruce Negus trained pacer will head to Sunday’s Hannon Memorial at Oamaru and looks a strong chance of giving some of the big guns a bit of a fright based on his recent trial and workout form.
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