JOHN Sadler's understandable enthusiasm at winning his first group 1 race since returning to training earlier this year was yesterday tempered by an unkind barrier draw for his filly Heidilicious in Saturday's Queensland Oaks at Eagle Farm, reports The Age. It says: Sadler, who is only part-way through building a new team at Flemington and, in time, at Ballarat, looked at Heidilicious as a short-term flagship of the stable after her brief but highly impressive career. But barrier 15 in Saturday'
JOHN Sadler's understandable enthusiasm at winning his first group 1 race since returning to training earlier this year was yesterday tempered by an unkind barrier draw for his filly Heidilicious in Saturday's Queensland Oaks at Eagle Farm, reports The Age.
It says: Sadler, who is only part-way through building a new team at Flemington and, in time, at Ballarat, looked at Heidilicious as a short-term flagship of the stable after her brief but highly impressive career. But barrier 15 in Saturday's classic has deflated the trainer's hopes of a major race win close to the end of this first racing season back.
''We had planned to go forward if the draw was kind to us and now we have to go back to scratch,'' Sadler said yesterday. ''It's a pity as she has done really well in Brisbane leading up to the race and she had no luck the other day at Doomben when beaten out of a place...She got baulked twice at a vital stage in the straight. And she just had staying written all over her in the final 200 metres. But the gate will mean we go back and when you go back most of the time you get beaten.
''An inside draw means you can sneak forward and get a nice run without going mad, but now from out there you are in the hands of others and statistics tell you that when you go back you don't often wins Oaks,'' Sadler said.