THE PUNISHER BACK IN WINNING FORM

By Graham Potter | Sunday, October 20, 2024

The Punisher scored his third career win when taking out a Class 3 Plate over 1400m at the Sunshine Coast on October 20.

It had been eight months since the four-year-old son of Sidestep had visited the winners’ enclosure, and there was a similarity in the road he followed to victory on that occasion to that which brought him to this latest success.

When The Punisher won that BM65 Handicap over 1200m at Ipswich back on February 29, he came into the race on the back of two placed finishers … twice finishing in second place.

This time around it was two successive third places that posted a warning of the win that was to follow, the last of those coming when going down by less than a length over 1350m at Ipswich on October 3.

Melea Castle, who had ridden The Punisher in both of those third place finishes, was again aboard the Tony and Maddysen Sears trained runner on this occasion, with her effort in the saddle being as deserving of the victory as the performance of the horse.

Easy to back at $8.50, Castle had The Punisher nicely away at the break before settling in a perfect third place, tracking the speed, just over two lengths off the leader.

The leaders held station all the way down the back stretch and through the sweep to the home turn and it was soon after straightening that Castle edged The Punisher out across the heels of the two leaders before setting out on what would be a sustained finishing effort.

Approaching the 300m mark, The Punisher was up to second … and building momentum. One hundred metres later, the Sears trained runner took over at the head of affairs, but the job wasn’t dome yet as the chasers kept coming, meaning that The Punisher and Castle had to be resilient to the line … and that they were, in the end prevailing by a comfortable enough 1.30 length margin.

This result took The Punisher’s career earnings through the $100 000 mark to $106 970, which has been accrued via three wins and six minor placings from seventeen starts.

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