ACQUIRED BOUNCES BACK

By Graham Potter | Tuesday, June 23, 2009

The John Wallace trained Acquired stepped down in class and raced over a better surface than he had in his last two starts when contesting a Class 6 Handicap over 1200m at Eagle Farm on Saturday. These two facts combined to help produce a winning formula for the four-year-old mare who has now won five of her twenty one starts.

4yo & Up Class 6 Handicap - 1200m. Time: 1-10.52.
Track - Good 3. Rail - out 1m.
1 Acquired; 2 One For None; 3 Hussta La Vista
Eagle Farm - Saturday, June 20.

WINNER FEEDBACK:
Trainer John Wallace: “She just needed a better track, mate. She’s been racing fair in her last two but she didn’t really like the wet.” (Acquired’s last two run were on heavy going. They were also in the Listed Chief De Beers and the Lightning Handicap - a class above the opposition she met here).

“I think she needed a bit more pace on too. It would have been better. She’s just taken time mate. She’s been a bit immature ... but a lot of O’Reilly mares get better as they get older. He rides good this jockey doesn’t she? He’s a good rider mate. He’s probably the most promising rider I’ve seen in years, so the sky is the limit there.

“I said to him today, they’ve all been grabbing it out. I said to him give it a bit of a dig out of the barriers and put it there because their might not be a great deal of speed in the race - and there wasn’t. They didn’t go that fast.

‘I’m going to bite the bullet ... the Ascot Handicap is 1200m now. I’m going to have a go at that because I want to get a bit of black type on it. She’ll race alright. I think I gave them $170 000 for her in New Zealand. She’s a half-sister to Hips Don’t Lie and it was sold for $770 000 the other day at the broodmare sale*.”

Apprentice jockey Brent Evans: “If you had a look at the form, there wasn’t a hell of a lot of speed in the race. She was always going to bounce out. We wanted to ride her a bit closer today. So I give her a dig and she just put herself there, you know. From there I just had her comfortable and relaxed under me. There was a tight run at the top of the straight and she just pushed through it. I always had a horse under me to do it. I just got a good sprint outside of (Darren) Gauchi and she was never going to get beat.”

*Acquired and Hips Don’t Lie are both out of the Centaine broodmare, Procure. Acquired is by O’Reilly. Hips Don’t Lie is by Stravinsky. Both are five-time winners but the stake earnings ($522 250) of the lightly raced Hips Don’t Lie (who has only run 13 times) substantially outstrips that of Acquired courtesy of two Listed successes and one Group 2 win. Acquired is currently closing in on the $100 000 earnings mark.

PRICE FLUCTUATIONS:
Winner (Acquired): 4.20 out to 4.80.
The winner was the favourite. She was the only favourite to salute on the card.

STEWARDS REPORT EXTRACT:
Notification of correct weight was delayed when stewards wished to confirm whether Rumba Jack had been denied a fair start. It was established that as the start was effected, Rumba Jack (L. Cassidy) refused to jump away with the body of the field and took no part in the event. Trainer M. Nolan was advised that he would be required to provide a further barrier certificate for Rumba Jack prior to its next race start.