BRC JUL 08 - SWORD OF DAMOCLES HANGS TOUGH

By Matthew Grimson | Thursday, July 9, 2009

Eagle Farm, July 8, 2009.
Class 4 Handicap (C, G & E) - 1200m. Time: 1-12.10.
Track - Dead 5. Rail - out 5m.
1 Sword of Damocles; 2 Chilled; 3 Mr Standfast.

The Jackie Crompton trained Sword Of Damocles scored a commanding end to end win, warding off all challenges in convincing fashion to take out her fourth career win from only eleven starts.

A line of horses, headed by Mr Steadfast, appeared to be waiting to pounce on the leader as the field entered the home, but Sword Of Damocles wasn’t about to surrender his advantage. He maintained a strong, resolute gallop which broke the back of most of the challenges and it was left to Chilled to sneak up along the inside to keep the contest alive.

Try as Chilled might though, with jockey Stathi Katsidis hard at work chasing his first winner since his return to riding, Sword Of Damocles had his measure and the four-year-old stayed on to claim the result.

WINNER FEEDBACK:
Trainer Jackie Crompton: “He’s done well. He didn’t have a lot of luck in some races and then the wet track last start probably brought him undone a little bit ... and it was his first go over 1300m last start.” The four-year-old was back over 1200m here. He has now had two goes at the distance and won them both.

“It’s been four weeks between run. We were going to go to Coloundra on Cup day and we scratched because it was wet. We didn’t want to run him on a Heavy 10.

“I was confident today, I was a little bit worried about the track, but we thought he’d run well.”

Jockey Michael Palmer: “He’s quite a nice little horse that horse. He jumped from the alley and had to do a little bit of work to get there. Once he got there he relaxed really well underneath me. Once we straightened up he kicked again. He kicked quite strong and stuck there towards the end. He’s a nice little horse actually. He’ll go through the grades I think.”

PRICE FLUCTUATIONS:
Winner (Sword of Damocles): 4.60 out to 6.50.
Favourite (Ice Tee): 3.00 in to 2.60. Finished last - tailed off. Failed to jump.

STEWARDS REPORT EXTRACT:
Correct weight was delayed to allow connections of Ice Tee the opportunity to view the stewards video to ascertain if the gelding was afforded a fair start. After viewing the video, stewards were satisfied that Ice Tee lost considerable ground as a result of the horse standing flatfooted as the start was effected. Trainer G. Ryan's representative was advised that Ice Tee must trial satisfactorily prior to its next race start. Near the 600m, Chilled (S. Katsidis) was crowded for room by One Eyed (O. Turpin), which shifted in.