Hunter Valley trainer Shane Tritton has arrived in New Zealand ready to put the final touches on Salty Robyn in the lead up to Saturday’s Harness Jewels. The son of Art Official was narrowly beaten in a workout last Saturday by the Mark Purdon trained Dream About Me with the final quarter clocked in a scintillating 25.6.
Salty Robyn led from the start in the field of three with Mark Jones in the sulky and looked set for victory after dashing away turning for home but was grabbed late with the official margin between the first two runners just a half-head.
“Salty Robyn has come through the hit-out really well, I think Saturday’s run proves that he is back at the top of his game because he is as much better horse than he showed at Addington last start,” said Tritton.
“I was at Melton for the Queen Of The Pacific on Saturday night and flew directly from Melbourne and arrived in New Zealand on Sunday, I’ll look after him for the rest of the week and Lauren (Panella) will fly in after driving at Newcastle on Thursday.”
Tritton believes Salty Robyn was a run short before his last start 7th in the New Zealand Sires Stakes.
“On reflection he was underdone going into the Sires, I gave him an easy time of it when he first arrived in New Zealand and in hindsight I may have been too soft on him.
“He will be spot on for Saturday, he has drawn well and he has good gate speed so he will be doing his normal thing and pushing forward at the start.”
The Purdon pair Chase The Dream and Lazarus will be the hardest to beat according to Tritton.
“Chase The Dream has beaten us twice already, Lazarus was in the Sires Final and finished third so he has shown how good he is too.
“Mark (Purdon) and Nat (Rasmussen) are the benchmark, they get the results and they will be extremely hard to beat.”
Tritton and Panella will return to Australia on Monday.
“We will fly back on the Monday and the horses will fly over on the Tuesday, I’ve got two other horses racing at Ashburton on Sunday (No Potato and Lurah) as well so it is going to be a big weekend for us.”
Harness Racing NSW (HRNSW) is the controlling body for harness racing in New South Wales with responsibility for commercial and regulatory management of the industry including 31 racing clubs across the State. HRNSW is headed by an industry-appointed Board of Directors and is independent of Government.
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