Lightly raced filly Leotie will round off her preparation for the Group 1 $500,000 Schweppes Thousand Guineas (1600m) at Caulfield on October 8 at Bendigo on Thursday.
Chris Parnham, above, will ride the Henry Dwyer trained Leotie at Bendigo. Photo by Adrienne Bicknell.
Trainer Henry Dwyer was forced to scratch Leotie from the Group 2 $200,000 Schweppes Thousand Guineas Prelude (1400m) at Caulfield last Saturday after the filly was treated late in the week for a minor respiratory infection.
“We scoped her on Thursday and she just had a bit of tracheal mucus and we had to treat her for that,” Dwyer said.
Dwyer said that the Darci Brahma filly has responded well to treatment and will step out in 1400m BenchMark 78 Handicap as her final lead up to the Thousand Guineas.
“So she hasn’t missed any work. She just missed that run but she needs to race somewhere so Bendigo fitted the bill,” Dwyer said.
“I don’t think it’s that much of a setback.”
“I think she would have been hard to beat the other day so it’s disappointing not to run in a Group Two race, but she’ll go to the races at Bendigo.
“We’re going to be there (in the Thousand Guineas) in the same condition we would have otherwise. We’ve just missed that Group Two run along the way.”
Dwyer thinks the big open spaces of the Bendigo track will suit Leotie’s racing style of getting back in the field and doing her best work at the finish.
“It’s a nice big, open track where you can get back and run on,” Dwyer said.
Leotie is the winner of two of her four race starts and showed she is well above average with a fast finishing second, beaten a head, to I Am A Star in the Group 3 $150,000 Winslow Group Stakes (1100m) at Caulfield on August 13.
Dwyer than dropped the filly back in class for a win in a 1400m three year old fillies BenchMark 78 Handicap at Caulfield on August 27.
While Leotie is marked as a $13 chance in the Thousand Guineas at Ladbrokes.com.au, the filly is certain to start very short when she steps out at Bendigo on Thursday with Chris Parnham in the saddle.
The Chris Waller pair of Foxplay at $3.60 and Omei Sword at $3.80 dominate the betting for the Thousand Guineas with the Lindsay Park trained Harlow Gold next in the market order at $7.
Foxplay and Omei Sword are both nominated for the Group 1 $500,000 Flight Stakes at Randwick on Saturday.
Early market order for the Thousand Guineas at Ladbrokes.com.au: $3.60 Foxplay, $3.80 Omei Sword, $7 Harlow Gold, $9 Yankee Rose, $11 Legless Veuve, Missrock, $13 Global Glamour, Leotie, Whispering Brook, $15 Awoke, La Luna Rossa, $17 Exocet, Samara Dancer, $21 I Am A Star, Sebring Dream, Serenely Discreet.
