The Moonee Valley track downgrading due to wet weather will suit Atomic Force

The rain continues to fall in Melbourne today and as a result questions continue to be asked about horses in the Manikato Stakes field.

Which ones can handle a dead surface, which ones can handle a slow surface and which ones could potentially handle a heavy surface?

There’s been a lot of debate regarding those that won’t take to the wet conditions, however in terms of which horse will handle it best there’s only one answer.

Atomic Force won his maiden Group 1 event, The Galaxy, on a heavy 10 Randwick track back in April.

He didn’t just win the race, he obliterated them, putting nearly three lengths on the second placed Thankgodyou’rhere.

That takes his total record to three wins and a second from six starts at that rating.

Considering he’s a horse that only really came to prominence at the end of 2010 the record is probably even stronger, twice since then he’s run on heavy for two wins.

On paper his slow track form isn’t quite as impressive but in reality it’s actually not too bad.

Three times he’s run on a  slow surface since December last year for two seconds and a third, only horses such as Temple Of Boom and Buffering getting in front of him.

As you can imagine trainer Darren Smith is far from concerned going into this evening, in fact you get the feeling he wouldn’t mind the rain to get a little harder.

“I don’t think the rain affected track will at all be a disadvantage…I’m not concerned if the track doesn’t dry out at all,” he said.

Atomic Force has barrier seven in the eight horse field tonight and Smith says he’s happy for the other horses to do all the work early.

“They are going to go hard in front and hopefully we can slot in behind them,” he said.

“We’ll be positive out the barriers and we’ll see where we end up.”

Atomic Force comes into this race after a last start third behind Buffering at Moonee Valley however one more stride and he probably would have got him.

“He looks great the horse, he’s really done well down here, I’m very happy with him,” he said.