Four to follow on Flemington Finals Race Day

“Flemington” 
Is there a sweeter sound for the punter or purist? How about:
“Where are they this weekend?” 
“Flemington – it's Finals Day” 

A trio of nice winners are among those set to line up in the TAB Next Generation Sprinters Series Final with the Lindsay Park-trained Bacash the pick of them on Timeform Ratings.

Bacash became the 19th individual 2yo winner for Ben, Will and JD Hayes this season when hammering a pair of placegetters who arrived with reasonable form in the book for a maiden at Cranbourne - his main rival turned out to be the clock, which he took care of as well.

Those 19 individual juvenile winners is the best return from any stable in Australia this season and the 28 races that they have won between them stands clear - James Cummings the only real pursuer having won 19 races. The best of the rest, Bjorn Baker and Ciaron Maher, have managed to get to halfway to the Hayes number with 14 wins apiece.

That record, along with a successful season more broadly, means that Team Hayes are a force to focus on this Flemington Finals Race Day and Bacash might be the best of the four that they are set to run. 

We can sharpen the focus to his clash with Job Done, a winner at Seymour last time in very different style to Bacash.

Where Bacash had experience on his side and ran time from the front, Job Done was having his first spin and did the business with a change of gear off a steady gallop. 

The clues are in the splits: Job Done 'could' run the time. Bacash has. 

It took seven starts for Pereille to win his maiden. He was odds-on in four of them and so while it took a long time for him to get off the mark, he landed a reputation very quickly…

So often these reputations are undeserved, but Pereille has seemed pretty committed to proving the knockers right. He has won a trio of handicaps since that maiden win, but he has won them at short prices – too short for punters looking to make a profit on a horse with a dozen losses in the book inside 2/1.

He has returned punters 31c on the dollar over the journey. His key rival at Flemington, Marble Nine, has given punters $1.68 for every dollar they have put behind him. So it is clear who will be cheered and who will be jeered over the fence on Saturday.

Great sport needs its villains, and the Finals Day card is better for Pereille being there, the spoiler to the solid option that Marble Nine presents.

Pereille backers could take heart in Tashi – now a Group One winner after snapping a drought of her own to win for the fifth time. Her drought began after beating Pereille at Randwick – the pair ripping home and returning ratings reserved for stakes horses.

Pereille won his next start by panels, again showing the sort of talent that has seen him so maligned. He can do good things; he just likes it, or needs it, to fall in his lap – and it hasn’t in ten starts since.

He’s had six jockeys in that ten-run stretch. Ben Melham will be the seventh to try and align the stars. He’s got a knack for this - he recently tricked Verdad! – a good jock for making something happen. 

To add to the intrigue, Pereille and Marble Nine are drawn on opposite wings of a seven-horse line. Perhaps if Pereille can’t see him he can’t concede to him.

Flemington lit up two weeks ago. Finals Day was around the corner and, as could be expected, the figures went through the roof.

The winning performances got better as the day went on and finished with a showstopper – She’s An Artist alright and she’s got a Timeform rating of 108 after just two starts.

Now the Creswick doesn’t go easy but in the past 15 years only two have run a bigger number to win it – Nature Strip and Passive Aggressive. Gytrash ran 108 as did Dubleanny (a personal favourite – everyone has a favourite Creswick winner).

This is a good Creswick but will be won on She’s An Artist’s brush and odds-on quotes are probably about right.

A quick look a three-year-olds to win winter handicaps with a rating of 108 (niche I know) paints a nice picture:

Uncommon James – Group 1 winner
Redzel – Group 1 winner
Vega Magic – Group 1 winner
Octavia – Group 3 winner

It’s never easy for an artist to follow up a critically acclaimed piece of work – just ask Jet, The Vines and the list goes on – but it’s harder to produce that work from nothing and She’s An Artist certainly has something.

Having enjoyed hors d'œuvres, an aperitif and the entrée we move to the main course – the VRC-CRV Winter Championship Series Final. 

As always, it’s a belter, breathe it in.

Things didn’t pan out for Jimmy The Bear and Tom Prebble when Oh Too Good slipped him around Flemington at the start of June, but two weeks on – two weeks ago – things had fallen a whole lot better.

Tom had found a prime pitch, and the pace was strong, but there came a moment. We could find trouble here! But Tom had a willing partner, a bear, and together they channelled the kids classic, ‘We’re Going On A Bear Hunt’. 

Uh Oh! Tiring leaders! We can’t go under them, we can’t go over them, we’ve got to go through them!

Jimmy reached down, responded and through them he went with Tom along for the wonderful ride. A rating of 116 was the result. The best modern winner of the Winter Championship, Doubtful Jack, ran to 116 – so it’s a meaningful marker.

But this time Jimmy meets Oh Too Good again and on worse terms. Her 113 in the lead up is strengthened by these terms and she goes about it the right way. She owns the map and that gives her a meaningful headstart.

This tussle is worth the admission fee alone but wait, there’s more!

Three more last start winners: Yellow Sam, Hughes and Cafe Millenium.

Cafe Millenium ran the lowest rating of that trio, but it was a significant win in other ways. Well, one other way - he got the monkey off the back.

For Cafe Millenium had faced the same heckles as our good friend Pereille – a non-winner having gone 17 runs without a prize since a successful debut but (and having started at 14/1 on debut is carrying a lot of the freight here…) he can now claim to be a profitable horse as well. $1.04 returned to punters for every dollar wagered on him across the 19-run span of his career. 

Cafe Millenium has a flaw not dissimilar to Pereille. He has talent but he is slow to get going. A lazy horse, lazy tactics, or a combination of the two have meant that Cafe Millenium has landed in some low-percentage positions in his time but when he gets going he’s got plenty to offer – his Randwick Guineas third over a mile – weaker Guineas or not – a potent pointer to his chance here.

This Winter Championship Final runs deep. The chances begin but don’t end with the five last-start winners, and the betting should be as strong as the race itself, but from a sporting point of view it’s all eyes on Jimmy The Bear.

To overcome such a task would stamp him a winter champion - a champion for the punters and the purists.