Sydney’s leading Lady Of The Turf Gai Waterhouse had added more ammunition to her Melbourne Cup quest with the acquisition of the well performed English stayer Fiorente from the Sir Michael Stoute stable.
Waterhouse along with her husband Rob, selected Fiorente while in England during the therie end of season trip and were very impressed with the four year old winning the Group 2 £110,000 Princess Of Wales’s Goldsmiths Stakes (1 mile 4 furlongs) at Newmarket on July 12.
“He must be one of the best looking horses I have ever seen,” Waterhouse said.
“Rob and I watched him race at Newmarket after Rob selected him as a potential purchase.”
“We’re very excited. He’ll go straight into the Melbourne Cup.”
The Newmarket winner will join Waterhouse’s other two English imports, Glencadam Gold and Julienas in her bid to claim glory over the Melbourne Cup Carnival.
Julienas has had three Australian start with the Waterhouse stable winning the Listed $150,000 Carlton Mid Wyong Gold Cup (2100m) at Wyong on September 7 and is on the Spring Cups trail.
While Glencadam Gold is undefeated from three starts since arriving in Australia with his latest win the Group 3 $200,000 Tooheys New Newcastle Gold Cup (2300m) at Newcastle on September 20 and is on the same path as Julienas.
Top Sydney jockey Nash Rawiller had glowing reports for Glencadam Gold after his all the way win at Newcastle and is expecting the import to keep on improving during the Spring.
“I ran them along at a genuine clip the whole way and let this horse really get into his own rhythm, made it a staying test. This bloke’s all class, isn’t he,” Rawiller said.
“He’s been well performed over in England and Gai has put the finishing touches on him. He’ll just keep taking the next step this horse. He was bit lost today at the furlong, started seeing things that weren’t there, he gives you a very good feel of a good horse.”
Julienas can take one step closer to a Melbourne Cup start if he can perform well in today’s Group 3 $125,000 Alea Actuarial Consulting Colin Stephen Quality (2400m) at Rosehill.
Fiorente is fully qualified for the Group 1 $6m Emirates Melbourne Cup (3200m) at Flemington on November 6 and will now prepare for his trip to Melbourne with the second wave of European Spring Carnival hopefuls on October 20.
Waterhouse indicated that she would go straight into the Melbourne Cup without another run with the Monsun entire recently running at Longchamp in Paris beating one runner home in a five horse field in the Group 2 £110,000 QATAR Prix Foy (1 mile 4 furlongs) on September 16.
Fiorente is currently thirtieth in the order of entry for the Melbourne Cup and is rated a $26 chance at the moment.
