Aiden De Campo will be looking to lead all the way tomorrow night at Gloucester Park in the Taste Of WA 4YO Championship (G3), with impressive mare Copy Cat Queen getting her chance from barrier one.
“I think she will go really well. I will try lead with her, and I think if she settles, she will be hard to beat.” Aiden De Campo said.
The double westbred mare is the 10th living foal out of Luvya Maddy Lombo, by My Hard Copy NZ, and has already earned owner Vince Vinciullo in excess of $200,000 in stakes.
Copy Cat Queen took out the Gr2 4YO Westbred Classic on W Night, Friday, September 5, when she won impressively by a 20.6m margin after starting from barrier 8.
A winner of six from nine attempts this preparation, De Campo is confident his girl has what it takes to beat the boys this week.
“She’s beat the boys before, and last start gives me confidence, she matched it with them.
“She’s been super this time in, her last run in the 4YO Classic at Pinjarra was really, really good, they ran home in blistering time, and she was four and five wide doing it and still getting through the line.
Yet to lead so far in her 35-start career, De Campo is confident she has the speed to hold up, his only query is whether she will settle enough if pushed early.
“She’s probably not noted as a leader, but I don’t think she’s ever lead in her career, but there’s 50,000 reasons tomorrow night to try.” De Campo told the Sports Daily on Thursday morning”
“She’s got great gate speed, I think the only time she’s drawn one, she could have held Water Lou, so she has enough gate speed, the only problem I have is if I really rev her up out of the gate, is kind of getting her to settle.
“If she settles, the times she can run off the track, you put them on the fence, you’d think she would be hard to beat, but she hasn’t led before, but all indications at home is that she would be a really good leader, she works in front and struggles to get beat at home.”
Despite his numerical form not presenting at his best, De Campo has faith in Rockandrollartist in race two, who’s drawn awkwardly in barrier six.
“He was racing without luck for a few runs there and last start he just had to do too much, blistering lead time, and three deep by the time he got there, and we had one over racing outside of us, going a little bit quicker than we wanted to, it all went against the plan.
“But tomorrow night he’s dropping a long way in grade, if he can just bounce them off the gate and get to the front, he will be very hard to beat. I’m really happy with him, he just needs a little bit of luck in running which he hasn’t been getting.
De Campo has added a hood for tomorrow’s race hoping to sharpen up the six-year-old.
Ashleigh Paikos
Image: Pacepix