04 January 2022 | Ken Casellas | Photo: Hamilton Content Creators
Victorian-bred Miss Boudica ended her three-year-old season in a blaze of glory with a brilliant victory in the 2130m Retravision Pace for fillies at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
At her second appearance after an eight-month absence, Miss Boudica, the third favourite at $5, enjoyed an ideal passage, one-out and one-back, before surging home powerfully to beat the fast-finishing Newsy ($26) by two lengths at a 1.56.6 rate to improve her record to 13 starts for six wins, six placings and stakes of $68,081, a handsome return for a $16,000 purchase.
“Now, from the start of the year she will be a four-year-old mare and will be left in limbo for a little bit, with no real targets on the horizon for her now,” said part-owner and trainer Michael Brennan.
“But she will continue her education and her ring craft, and we will aim for the big races for mares at the end of the year. She will definitely be up to it by then.”
Brennan said that Miss Boudica had been off the scene for eight months because being a tall, lanky filly she needed time to develop and to fill out.
“She did a big job winning the group 2 APG Consolation for three-year-olds at the end of last May, rating 1.54.3 over 1730m,” he said. “She has shown us that she has an enormous amount of ability. She has gone 1.54 twice and has beaten the boys (colts and geldings).
Another performance that was a strong indication of her wonderful potential was when she charged home from eleventh at the bell to finish third in a three-way photo behind Benesari Lane and Always An Angel in the WA Oaks last April.
In Friday night’s race the polemarker Bettors Destroya set a solid pace and was put under plenty of pressure by the $2.10 favourite Nevermindthechaos, who eventually took a narrow lead 460m from home. Miss Boudica, switched three wide by Michael Grantham at the 650m mark, burst to the front with 300m to travel.
Bettors Destroya battled on to finish fourth, with Nevermindthechaos, a winner at her two previous starts, fading to fifth.
Approved By Dean Baring www.harnessbred.com
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