The former Hong Kong based trainer David Hayes will have no fewer than six runners in Saturday’s Blue Diamond Stakes (G1 - 1200m) as he attempts to win the race for the sixth time.
The A$1.5 million two-year-old race is one of six simulcast races from Caulfield, in Melbourne, this Saturday and is complemented by two other G1 contests - the 1400m Futurity Stakes and 1100m Oakleigh Plate.
Hayes, who now trains in partnership with his son Ben and nephew Tom Dabernig, will be represented by Catchy (Craig Williams), Formality (Ryan Moore), Tulip (Damien Oliver), Wait For No One (Regan Bayliss), Muraahib (Steven Arnold) and Will’s Bid (Damian Lane).
However, another runner with a strong Hong Kong connection will be hoping to spoil the Hayes party. That is the Robert Smerdon trained Property who will be ridden by Joao Moreira and who’s raced by the Hong Kong based Price Bloodstock, managed by David Price and his wife Jenny Chapman.
Property ran second to Hayes’ Catchy on debut in January but has won his two subsequent starts which prompted connections to pay a A$55,000 late entry fee which was required as the Starcraft gelding was not originally nominated for the race.
The two horses have been marked as equal favourites for the race but Property fared best at the barrier draw, coming up with gate three while the filly Catchy drew 13.
Hayes had little luck at the draw with five of his six runners drawing double figure gates but that may not necessarily prevent him from adding to his already record tally of five Diamond wins. Seven Blue Diamond winners in the past 20 years have drawn double figure barriers with three scoring from barrier 15.
The trainer, noted after the draw, that barriers may not be of too much significance given that “eight of the past ten Diamond winners have come from back in the field.”
“I’ve got a very strong team who are all very fit and very well and that's a great position to be in come Diamond day,” said Hayes who has dominated the two-year-old racing this season and, in fact, had 11 youngsters qualified to run in Saturday’s race.
Aside from Property, the powerful Hayes team will also be challenged by two runners from the Peter and Paul Snowden team and three prepared by Tony McEvoy, the man who trained the Lindsay Park team in Australia when Hayes was based in Hong Kong.
The Snowdens, who’ve won the race three times in past six years, have a strong hand with Pariah - who was second to Property at his latest start - and Taking Aim who will wear blinkers for the first time.
The pick of McEvoy’s runners may well be the filly Roomooz to be ridden by Dwayne Dunn who won the Blue Diamond four years straight from 2005 with three of the victories coming aboard Hayes trained runners.
