A RESULT WHICH AGAIN UNDERLINED THE FACT THAT THERE ARE NO CERTAINTIES IN RACING

By Graham Potter | Saturday, June 10, 2023

Punters expected Yellow Brick to ‘just win’ when he lined up in the Group 3 Gunsynd Classic over 1600m at Eagle Farm on June 10 … Stradbroke Day … but that old racing adage that there is no certainty in racing came back to bite them.

Yellow Brick, who started at the restrictive odds of $1.35, began well, but again quickly drifted back to just worse than midfield as the field went down the back stretch,
racing a full seven lengths off the leader End Assembly ($6.50) and, more importantly in terms of how the race would pan out, four lengths behind Rediener.

Ben Thompson did move Yellow up in the sweep to the home turn, but he did so racing a full five wide at the point of the turn.

Rediener ($9.50), who held a slight edge, and Soothsayer ($14) surged to the head of affairs early in the home straight and immediately joined issued in a spirited stride for stride battle.

In the first half of the straight Yellow Brick struggled to make any inroads on the two leaders. While always putting in, it would be fair to say it took a while for Yellow Brick to hit his straps and, when he did, he showed why he is held in such high esteem.

The four-length deficit became three lengths at the 150m mark … and then two at the 100m mark … then it was down to a length with 50m left to run … and then a big stretch and a big push from Thompson cut that fast-diminishing deficit to just 0.15 lengths at the finish … the effort failing by just a stride to land the win the betting boards had predicted.

In the end, it was a massive effort by Yellow Brick, which ultimately only a small measure of consolation to the hard fact that the son of The Mission has now finished second in three of the last four feature races he has contested … the Magic Millions Three-Year-Old Guineas, the Fred Best Classic and now the Gunsynd Classic.

While this is not a money game for the Sears stable … they have already turned down multiple, big money purchase offers for Yellow Brick … it is still interesting to note that the difference in prize-money between first and second place in the races mentioned is just over $1 million.

Such are the fine lines which make up the fabric of racing.

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