Blitzthemcalder with Chris Alford and Ross Payne following their Breeders Crown success last year.
It’s by no means outrageous to suggest Blitzthemcalder is the most exciting squaregaiter on the Australian landscape.
The Ross Payne-trained three-year-old took all before him in his juvenile season, capping it with a crushing victory in the Breeders Crown.
The scary thing for every other trainer with a nice trotter at home is the message coming from Payne himself.
There are few comparisons that can be drawn between the Blitzethemcalder who won 10 of his 13 starts as a two-year-old, by an average of a tick under 11 metres, and the one that is going to turn up to Tabcorp Park Friday night.
He is a different horse.
The Pryde’s EasiFeed 3YO Trot may be the starting point for the son of Metropolitan, however the Lara-based horseman has vast plans this time in.
“I didn’t want to start him too early because he’s got a big season ahead of him,” Payne said.
“This race is sort of like a trial, we will find another similar race after this. Then we will go to the Prince Of Speed at Tabcorp Park in March and if he is going as well as I expect he will be off to New Zealand.
“He can take on the Derbies and those types of races over there. He’ll still be back in time for the Vicbred, the Victoria Derby and the Breeders Crown in Victoria.”
The schedule would appear jam-packed however if there is a horse worthy of the hype it could be Blitzthemcalder.
He was an enigmatic trotter in his first season, galloping in all of his defeats, and even perhaps his most famous win in the Empire Stallions Vicbred Super Series final.
(click here to watch his extraordinary performance)But this time around Payne holds no fears of being brought undone. There is almost an air of certainty about the horse he lives with and knows so well.
“I’ve been looking forward to it for a long time. He had seven weeks off after the Breeders Crown and I’ve just brought him up slowly,” he said.
“He’s just a different horse this season, he’s never had speed before but he has it now. A good friend of mine from New Zealand, Phil Williamson, said not to worry because it will come as he gets older and he was right.
“He’s just got speed early and speed late now; he’s the full package.
The speed that his trainer talks of was a major concern to punters in his two-year-old year, on more than one occasion he drew the pole as odds-on favourite and was swiftly crossed by horses with a sharper turn of foot off the gate.
You can expect that to change starting Friday night and despite being back in the cart himself, Payne believes Chris Alford is the man for the job.
“It’s going to take a good horse to get the front off him. A 28-second quarter is nothing to him now,” he said.
“I’ve driven him all his work and I’m back driving at the races now but there is no way I am taking Chris (Alford) off him. He’s done a great job and it takes the pressure off me.
“I think I’ve got the best horse so I might as well put the best driver on him. He’s keen to come to New Zealand depending on his commitments in Australia at the time.”
