EF SEPT 12 - FEMINA FASHION UNDERLINES POTENTIAL

By Matthew Grimson and Graham Potter | Monday, September 14, 2009

Eagle Farm, September 12, 2009.
3yo QTIS Handicap -1200m. Time: 1-10.59.
Track - Good 3. Rail - out 3m.
1 Femina Fashion; 2 Facile Tigre; 3 Redbolt.

Jockey Larry Cassidy completed a double on the card when he guided the Trevor Whittington trained Femina Fashion to an end-to-end victory which took the lightly raced filly’s career record to a promising two wins from only four starts.

Cassidy’s judgement was a strong factor in the result as he let the chestnut bowl along a half length in front of the much-vaunted Facile Tigre, dictating the pace of the race to the main fancy.

As Facile Tigre looked to quicken and attempted to go past Femina Fashion early in the straight, Cassidy similarly asked more of his mount and Femina Fashion displayed both the ability and the commitment to meet the challenge of Facile Tigre, doing what she needed to maintain her advantage to the line.

WINNER FEEDBACK:
Trainer Trevor Whittington: “I did give him (jockey Larry Cassidy) free reign. I said, you’re riding it, you do what you have to do, but it’d be better if you could take a sit, you know. But it’s no good sitting three or four deep either. That is the difference with a good rider, isn’t it. Full credit to Larry. He has worked hard to get where he is.

“Where does she go now? Well, if she pulls up good ... and it all depends on that ... she’ll go to Sydney for the Reginald Allen in a fortnight, but I’ll wait a couple days before I make that final decision. If she comes through that Sydney run good, she can start in the Flight Stakes which is a week later. Then she would go to the paddock and have ten days to a fortnight off and then get ready for the Magic Millions.”

Jockey Larry Cassidy: “Yeah, the plan was to go forward but obviously there was a lot of speed inside of me ... and just really to see what happened. So Trevor sort of left it to me. If she pinged out and I got across easy ... we didn’t think she had that speed.. you know, we were going to take a sit.

“There was a slight opportunity when I could have got in behind Facile Tigre, but I would of have had to really strangle her so I thought no, instead of doing that I’ll press on and I’ll get her to come back to me and she just dropped the bit beautiful.

“Facile Tigre got to probably about a head in front of me and I hit her a couple times with the whip and because she found somewhat I put the whip away and just pushed her hands and heals, cause I knew the last 150 would be the test. She kept finding which was good. I am sure she will take good improvement from it (Femina Fashion was racing first-up after a four month spell) and I am sure she will get a bit further too because she’s got good gate speed but she relaxes with it which is very important.”

PRICE FLUCTUATIONS:
Winner (Femina Fashion): 9.00 out to 11.00.
Favourite (Facile Tigre): 3.50 out to 3.60 in to 3.30.

STEWARDS REPORT EXTRACT:
As P. Hammersley was to be overweight, D. Craven was substituted as the rider of Sequastaire. P. Hammersley was fined $100m. Sniplaz (C. McIver) jumped away awkwardly and missed the start. Facile Tigre (L. Rolls) jumped inwards at the start, forcing Benefaction (S. Seamer) in on to Sequastaire (D. Craven).

Approaching the 300m, Emma’s Heart (S. Katsidis) shifted out from behind the heels of Captain Clayton (M. Cahill) to improve and the horse made heavy contact with Sniplaz, causing it to become unbalanced. S. Katsidis was instructed to exercise greater care when shifting ground. Captain Clayton (M. Cahill), Sniplaz and Sequastaire all raced wide throughout.

When questioned as to the seemingly disappointing performance of Sniplaz, C. McIver stated that whilst the horse was obliged to race wide, he felt as though it may have jarred up on the surface today and he felt that the horse's best form has been on tracks which had been rain affected.

A post race veterinary examination of Facile Tigre revealed the gelding to be suffering from metabolic heat syndrome.

Whittington