Quality sprinter Better Than Ready will trial in Brisbane next Tuesday before heading to Victoria to begin his 2014 Melbourne Festival Of Racing campaign in the Group 2 Rubiton Stakes (1100m) at Caulfield on February 8.
Better Than Ready will return to racing in the Rubiton Stakes at Caulfield on February 8. Photo by: Daniel Costello
Better Than Ready had just two starts in his last preparation, after missing the 2013 Spring Racing Carnival due to injury, and carried big weights to win the Club Super Handicap (1000m) at Eagle Farm on November 9 and the Listed Keith Noud Handicap (1200m) at the same venue on November 23.
Trainer Kelly Schweida told Racing Ahead this morning that Better Than Ready only spent three weeks in the spelling paddock following his Keith Noud Handicap and said he will be looking to get the colt to Melbourne just before the end of January, so he has the chance to gallop at Caulfield before the Rubiton Stakes.
“He has a trial next Tuesday and hopefully we will head to Melbourne,” Schweida said.
“He only had three weeks off, we couldn’t give him a lot of time off, but being a stallion he gets away on you quick.
“We will see how he pulls up next Tuesday and we will access it after that.
“I wouldn’t mind getting there a week or ten days before so he could do a bit of work around that Caulfield track.”
The connections of Better Than Ready are desperate to win a Group 1 event with the stallion prospect and the son of More Than Ready will have his first crack at the highest level of racing this year when he contests the Group 1 Oakleigh Plate (1100m) at Caulfield on February 22.
Schweida said he is not locked into a set path with Better Than Ready and will chase a Group 1 victory in Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane depending on the form of the talented sprinter.
“It just depends on what his form warrants and he has got to try and win a Group 1 somewhere,” Schweida said.
“From February right through to June there is a Group 1 every second week for sprinter, so it just depends on how he is going.
“We are going to go whenever we can try and win a Group 1.”
Rick McMahon has partnered Better Than Ready in each of his eight career wins and Schweida said that the Queensland-based jockey is likely to retain the ride on the four-year-old.
