SOUTH East trainer Michael O’Leary has had plenty of top gallopers over many decades.
Evenmoreaction has been his flagship horse in recent years with a plethora of cup victories, but another star for the stable emerged at Naracoorte on Friday.
The four year old mare Save Me Ned, at only her second run from a four month spell, swamped her rivals with a last to first sprint in the 1100 metre BM 80 handicap.
Save Me Ned showed plenty of potential as a three year old and the hard track at Horsham was her undoing when a first up last of five earlier this month.
Friday was her first start above BM 70 grade, and she disposed of some talented rivals.
The heavy track held no fears, and Save Me Ned made it four wins from nine starts in super impressive style.
Fellow Mount Gambier sprinter Elzette was heavily backed at her return for a spell ($2.70-$2.15 fav.) and ran third after being gifted a rails run at the top of the straight.
An excellent return to racing also from the runner up Strategic Glass from an enforced 33 month break.
From a Mount Gambier cup point of view, the run of Unicaja in the 2000 metre open handicap was eye catching.
Although Unicaja had to be content with second place, the seven year old mare ran home very strongly from last at the 500 metres to get within a length and a half of the winner Cheners.
For the Sue Jaensch trained Cheners, it was a welcome change of luck after missing the start badly at Bordertown last month and then blocked for a run at a crucial stage when sixth at Mount Gambier on November 5.
The betting on Friday suggested that Cheners ($6-$9) was not up to open class company, but apprentice Emily Finnegan was able to give her an ideal run in third spot before applying the pressure to the hot favourite – and leader – Survived at the 600 metres.
Survived obviously does not like being pestered in the lead and he was immediately a beaten horse as Cheners dashed to a winning lead.
Before Friday, Survived was looked upon as the probable favourite for the Mount Gambier cup on Friday week, having won it in successive years (2016 & 2017), but showed there are definite chinks in his armour if not able to stroll along and dictate terms out in front.
53 mms of rain in the days leading up to the meeting made for an initial Heavy 8 track rating and there were 23 scratchings from the original 88 acceptors.
Stewards quickly down graded the track to a Heavy 10 following race one.
Honours for the day went to apprentice Trent Germaine and trainers Sue Jaensch and Sue Murphy, each with winning doubles.
