CHAMPION pacer Leap To Fame is close to a racetrack return and could have a three-race Victorian campaign.
Owner Kevin Seymour said plans would be finalised “in the next week or so.”
“We’re looking at a few races in Victoria around the Hunter Cup,” he said.
“It’s getting close to decision time. He may go down without a lead-up run, just a trial.
“We’ll have to make the call in the next week or so with the Ballarat Cup ($100,000 on January 18). We need to get some solid racing into him before a race like the Hunter Cup.”
Leap To Fame won last year’s Hunter Cup and stayed in Victoria for the $100,000 Group 2 Cranbourne Cup a week later.
“We would likely do that again,” Seymour said. “It worked well and fits his build-up to the Miracle Mile as well.
“It’s no secret we love taking the horse to the country (tracks) when we can. He got a great reception at Cranbourne last year.”
Leap To Fame won 15 of his 16 starts in 2024, but missed the Victoria and NZ Cups as well as the NSW Inter Dominion series with a niggling lower throat infection.
“We’ve got some lost time and opportunities to make up for,” Seymour said. “But, we also don’t want to plan too far ahead with the issues he’s had over the past couple of months.
“We’re close to deciding how we approach Melbourne and then the Miracle Mile is the next big one.
“Beyond that, we’ll just wait and see, but there are lots of options and it’s great to have the Inter Dominion back here (Brisbane) in July.”
Leap To Fame turns six tomorrow (Wednesday), but Seymour said there wasn’t any set plan when to retire him to stud.
“We’ve always said he’s a racehorse first and while he’s racing and winning like he has been, he’ll keep racing,” Seymour said.
“We’d love him to become the richest pacer of all-time and he could do that if he has as big a year in 2025 as he did this year.”
Seymour also stressed his wish for Leap To Fame to chase a feature race in NZ during 2025 after he aborted plans for the Race By Grins and missed the NZ Cup in 2024.
“As his stallion career gets closer, there’s certainly a value and importance to winning a big race in NZ so they can see with their own eyes how good he is,” he said.
Seymour revealed bold plans for his top young pacer Fate Awaits, a winner of five of his nine starts, including the inaugural Protostar and NSW Breeders Challenge.
“We’ll follow the same path with him as we did Leap To Fame at three and chase all the Derbys, starting with NSW In February,” Seymour said.
“We’ve got a really big opinion of him and he could even be my TAB Eureka horse this year.”
Seymour teamed with another three-year-old, the Emma Stewart-trained Bay Of Biscay, for a luckless second in the 2024 TAB Eureka.
Although he had first option to take Bay Of Biscay again as a four-year-old in 2025, Seymour has told the connections he will focus on one of his pacers, most likely Fate Awaits.
