Leading Sydney trainer Chris Waller is eyeing the Group 1 $2.5 million Caulfield Cup (2400m) with imported galloper Beaten Up.
Beaten Up will make his return to the races in the Warwick Stakes in Sydney tomorrow. Photo by: Daniel Costello
Beaten Up is set to begin his second preparation in Australia in the Group 2 Warwick Stakes (1400m) in Sydney on Saturday after a brief spell following a successful tilt at the 2013 Brisbane Winter Carnival.
The Beat Hollow gelding made his Australian racing debut with a ninth place finish in the Group 2 Ajax Stakes (1500m), suffered interference when finishing eleventh in the Doncaster Prelude (1600m) before improving significantly to finished second in the Listed Rowley Mile (1600m) at Hawkesbury and win the Group 1 Doomben Cup (2000m) in Brisbane.
Waller told Racing Ahead he is confident that Beaten Up will improve this campaign and is hopeful the five-year-old will perform well enough to qualify for the 2013 Caulfield Cup field.
“We would like to get towards the Caulfield Cup but we are realistic, you need to tick a lot of boxes before you get there,” Waller said on RSN.
“He needs to settle and relax in his races so it is good to see him with barrier one tomorrow and we will be looking to get him some cover and finishing off strongly.
“He has some very good form lines from England and he did a good job in his first Australian preparation.
“We are looking for a little bit of improvement this time in which would suggest then that he would be competitive in the Caulfield Cup.”
Beaten Up will face five of his stablemates in the Warwick Stakes tomorrow and although Waller doesn’t believe any of his charges are a winning chance against classy sprinter Rain Affair he is hopeful he can get a least one horse into the placings.
“The six that we have running will realistically need the run and I don’t know if they are sharp enough to win over 1400 at this level,” Waller said.
“Any of these that we have got resuming are a chance to run a place.
“We will learn a lot about each and every one of them tomorrow.”
Chris Waller is searching for his first win in the Caulfield Cup with his best previous result the eight place finish of Metal Bender in 2010.
