Australian Guineas winner Ferlax is set to join stablemate and big-race regular Rekindled Interest in being aimed at the $3 million Cox Plate (2040m).

Ferlax will be aimed at the Cox Plate. Photo by: Sarah Ebbett.

The rising four-year-old has just five career starts to his name but trainer Jim Conlan is predicting there are big things in store for the future stallion prospect.

“He’ll be entered for the Cox Plate but we’ve just got to see how the form measures up out of the Australian Guineas,” Conlan told Racing Victoria.

“I think he might be able to step up to the plate.”

Ferlax is back doing light work after being injured when seventh in the Randwick Guineas at Warwick Farm in March. The Sydney failure, which he came out of with genuine excuses, is the son of Pentire’s only defeat to date.

When superstar colt All Too Hard was ruled out of the Australian Guineas on race eve in March it became an open affair, allowing Ferlax to announce himself as a galloper of the future with an upset victory on the back of three wins at country tracks.

Conlan said it is likely he will begin his spring campaign in the Group 3 Aurie’s Star Handicap (1200m) on August 10 before tackling the recently elevated Group 1 Memsie Stakes (1600m) three weeks later.

Also to be set on a Cox Plate path is Rekindled Interest who will be out to bounce back after failing to measure up last spring.

The Moonee Valley specialist was third in the Group 2 Dato Tan Chin Nam Stakes but was unplaced in three other starts including a disappointing 14th in the Cox Plate.

This year will be the Redoute’s Choice gelding’s third crack at Australasia’s weight-for-age championship after finishing third to Pinker Pinker in 2011.

Conlan said the niggling injuries that have troubled the rising six-year-old have been addressed and he is hopeful the horse will return to his best this spring.