AVONE OVERCOMES TRAFFIC PROBLEMS TO MAKE IT BACK-TO-BACK WINS

By Graham Potter | Saturday, August 24, 2024

Avone ... now really back on song ... made it back-to-back wins when taking out a BM78 Handicap over 1050m at Doomben on August 24.

The Tony and Maddysen Sears trained four-year-old was installed as favourite on the back of her runaway, attention attracting win on August 10, starting at $2.25 ... with only two other runners quoted at odds of less than $11 ... and duly saluting by a 0.70 length margin.

Melea Castle, a 3kg claiming apprentice who rode Avone for the first time in her previous victory, was once again in the saddle and she again handled the responsibility with some aplomb after being caught in a pocket at the top of the straight.

As with the pervious win. Castle jumped Avone well enough out of the gates and, once certain she had secured a reasonable position, Castle was happy to allow the Sears trained runner to track the speed, sitting just over two lengths off the leader, saving ground, as the field went down the back stretch.

Avone then moved closer in the approach to the home turn, but it didn’t look good on straightened with Avone being trapped in a pocket at that stage, racing on the rail on the heels of the leader with another runner blocking her path to the outside.

With Avone clearly still full of running, it looked like a hard-luck story in the making with Avone still in trouble coming up to the 200m mark with Castle still endeavouring to shift Avone out into clear galloping room.

From there, with her head switched sharply to the left, Avone, in the first instance, was brave when responding under Castle’s urgings to edge into a narrow gap ... and then she was strong, powering forward with meaning and quickly building what would turn out to be winning momentum.

It did take Avone until there was only 50m left to run before she gained the upper hand over the $11 chance Mr Galazi, but she did do that and, in the end, it was a comfortable victory, margin-wise.

This was career win number four for Avone. She also has two runner-up finishes to her credit in just eleven starts ... and the $48 800 first prize money here took her career earnings flying through the $200 000 mark, all the way up to $237 150.

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