By Michael Guerin
Often in racing failure depends on your expectations.
For most horses, especially trotters, three group race seconds in 16 days and $35,000 in stakes might sound like a handy December.
But not when that horse is Speeding Spur and trainer John Dickie is not hiding from the fact his comeback star may have lost his title as the best trotter racing in New Zealand.
Speeding Spur returned from nine months on the sidelines with a huge second to a race-fit Temporale at Alexandra Park on December 15, suggesting that with champion Monbet sidelined, once Speeding Spur worked his way to peak fitness he would dominate the open class trotting scene.
That has proven to be wrong.
He was outpointed by Aussie veteran Kyvalley Blur at Cambridge nine days later and then led and was run down without an excuse by Temporale in the $100,000 National Trot at Alexandra Park on December.
Three starts, three seconds and a slipping crown.
“To be honest we were a bit surprised he got beaten in the National Trot,” says Dickie, who trains Speeding Spur with his son Josh.
“But maybe, after so long away from racing and as a six-year-old, he simply needs more racing.
“There is that, with the fitness and sharpness you can only get from racing, and also the fact these good young horses like Temporale are always going to be coming through.
“So it is not easy when you have a horse who has broken down twice. But do I think he will can get better with more racing? Yes.”
So Speeding Spur is now having his workload increased for a one-off shot at the $300,000 Great Southern Star at Melton on January 27.
He actually won the race when it was a heats-and-final sprint affair two years ago before finishing second last year when it was changed to a 2760m mobile.
It is still clearly the richest trot in the Southern Hemisphere and Dickie says too juicy a target to miss.
“That is what he is here for, to race and it is a huge race so we are definitely going,” says Dickie.
“But he won’t have a lead-up run over there, just a trial before we go.”
Speeding Spur has won half of his 36 starts and with $726,891 next to his name only needs to remain sound to become a rarity, an Australasian millionaire trotter who is also a stallion prospect.
He will probably be on the same plane to Melbourne as Temporale, as his trainer Tony Herlihy has decided to also go into the Great Southern Star without another run.
“I was looking at Ballarat on Jan 20 but with the heat wave they have had over there I might miss that and go straight to the Great Southern Star with the Dullard Cup a week later.”
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