They are stabled within a couple of hundred metres of each other at Warwick Farm and there are plenty of common themes for Pierata, She Will Reign and Music Magnate heading into Saturday’s Missile Stakes at Randwick.
Each is the apple of their trainer’s eye; if not the best horse they have had, potentially the best. And Greg Hickman, Gary Portelli and Bjorn Baker hope to see them back at Randwick in October for the $13 million Everest.
Missile like: Pierata charges away with the Magic Millions Guineas in January.
“It is there for everyone to dream about,” Hickman said. “You aren’t in The Everest til someone picks you for their slot, so it is different to any other race.
“At the moment I’m looking at Saturday and then we'll plan where to go after that. Put it this way, my car has a full tank of petrol and is pointing towards Melbourne if we have to go there.
"We can stay in Sydney as well, if someone wants us to run in The Everest.”
Pierata has delivered Hickman the most prizemoney of any horse he has trained, winning a $500,000 boost when he took the Magic Millions Guineas in style in January.
But Hickman believes there is much more to come from the Pierro four-year-old, which is the centre of stud offers after beating all but Kementari in the Randwick Guineas in the autumn.
His campaign will be aimed at getting that elusive group 1, but The Everest is another carrot dangling for Hickman.
“He is getting pretty close to the best I have had and I think he can take that mantle this time the way he has come back,” Hickman said. "He needs to tick that group 1 box.
“He has had his first real good spell and you can see the difference in him.
“It is not on the scales, he is only a couple of kilos heavier, but the way he is working he seems a lot stronger and I expect him to be very hard to beat in whatever races he runs in.
"He is ready for Saturday.”
She Will Reign is a couple of doors down from the Hickman yard and after winning a Golden Slipper and adding a Moir Stakes at three, the Manhattan Rain mare has nothing left to prove. She has had two trials to ready for Saturday, in the most recent beating Saturday rivals Takedown and Kementari.
A favourite: Gary Portelli with She Will Reign at his Warwick Farm stable.
“She is flying but when you get into races like this you need to be,” Portelli said. “When she won the Golden Slipper and Moir, I thought it doesn’t get better than this, but at this level you need to be at the top of your game to be winning.
“She has made me appreciate how good a horse like Rebel Dane was.
“She will always be a favourite and we would love to see her in another Everest, but like all the horses on Saturday she has to prove she is one they should pick.”
While the two four-year-olds are still improving, on course at Warwick Farm, Baker looks at Music Magnate, his only group 1 winner in his own right, and smiles.
Old stager: Music Magnate wins the Expressway Stakes at Rosehill last year.
“He has won a stakes race for the past four seasons and is a group 1 winner and taken me to the other side of the world,” he said. “He is like all the horses in the Missile Stakes looking to stake a claim for The Everest, but he is an eight-year-old.
"We just want him to come back and win again.”
Music Magnate is back from Dubai, where he finished down the track in the Al Quoz Sprint in March, but he has put together two barrier trial wins in preparation for his return.
“He has always been very good fresh and he is going to run a good race but this company is very strong and he will need to be at his best.”
Baker also has Egyptian Symbol lining in the Missile, which in the past would have been the perfect race for her.
“This race has changed a lot in the past couple years because of The Everest. I won it with a horse called Burbero three years ago and he wouldn't get sighted against these,” Baker said.
“Egyptian Symbol is very fit and ready to go and it will tell us where we are with her."
Source: Read Full Article