CHAMPION pacer Leap To Fame is primed to underline his Albion Park dominance tomorrow night (Saturday) in his final lead-up ahead of next month’s Inter Dominion series at his home track.
Grant Dixon’s six-year-old hasn’t been beaten at “The Creek” for almost 20 months, stringing together 18 successive Albion Park victories in that time.
Leap To Fame’s last Albion Park defeat came way back on November 4, 2023 when he was held up in traffic from an inside draw and finished a desperately unlucky fourth.
Remarkably, that race is the only time in 41 starts at the track he hasn’t finished in the top three. His overall Albion Park record is 35 wins, four seconds and a third.
It will be a major shock if Leap To Fame doesn’t add another win tomorrow night.
In contrast to coming off a daunting 30m handicap to win last start, Leap To Fame has the comfort of returning to mobile racing and a lovely gate two barrier draw.
Tomorrow night’s Lucky Creed is also over his favourite 2680m trip.
Leap To Fame, who made a clean sweep of all three heats and final in the 2023 Brisbane Inter Dominion, missed last year’s Sydney series because of illness.
He is already a dominant $1.35 prepost favourite in his quest to become just the eighth Australasian pacer to win multiple Inter Dominion finals.
Another Queensland great, and arguably the best of all time, Blacks A Fake holds the record with four Inter Dominion Grand Final wins.
Im Themightyquinn and Our Sir Vancelot won three each.
If Leap To Fame wins next month, he will get his chance to chase those greats ahead of him with the 2026 and 2027 Inter Dominions also both at Albion Park.
Trainer-driver Grant Dixon insists the six-year-old is “at least as good as ever.”
“We were thrilled how little the NZ trip took out of him a couple of months back and he was able to have that bit of a break after it before we wound him up again for this,” he said.
“We planned to give him two lead-up runs, but after the first one we thought he could do with three, so we added in that standing-start race.
“This will be his third and he’s a horse who thrives on his racing, so he will be right where we want him for the start of the (Inter Dominion) series.”
History awaits Leap To Fame in the $1 million Inter Dominion on July 19.
Victory will take him past Blacks A Fake as the all-time richest pacer in Australasia.
The only real danger looks to be Luke McCarthy’s star Don Hugo.
The five-year-old won last year’s Sydney Inter Dominion final, but didn’t have Leap To Fame to contend with.
Don Hugo has clashed three times with Leap To Fame and has beaten him once, in the Miracle Mile in March.
PHOTO: ID23 - Dan Costello
