EMERALD KINGDOM AND THAT GOLDEN TICKET

By Graham Potter | Monday, May 24, 2021

The Robert Heathcote trained six-year-old gelding Emerald Kingdom earned a golden ticket into the $1.5 million Stradbroke Handicap to be run at Eagle Farm on June 12 when he landed the BRC Sprint in style at Doomben on Saturday.

The winner of the BRC Sprint is exempt from the ballot for the Stradbroke.

One week earlier, Heathcote produced Prince Of Boom to win the Group 2 Champagne Classic, meaning the 2021 Queensland Winter Carnival is playing out rather nicely for the multiple premiership winning trainer … certainly far better than he anticipated going into the prime racing period in the Sunshine State.

“To say that the waters were muddy for the stable going into this year’s carnival would be an understatement,” said Heathcote. “The water was like the Brisbane river. You could walk on it.

“But now here we are … primed to go to the Stradbroke with Emerald Kingdom and have got Prince Of Boom going to the Sires produce on Saturday.

“Emerald Kingdom is already in the Stradbroke. We have a golden ticket, and I would be silly not to go there.

“He is going to get 52kg. Obviously, the Stradbroke is going to be a harder race than that race on Saturday and there is no denying that, but you can’t win it if you are not in it.

‘The experts said I was a $71 chance on Saturday.” (Emerald Kingdom eventually started at $31). “He led all of the way and won, and I wasn’t surprised to see him run like that. Everyone wrote him off because of his unplaced run first-up not accepting that he had excuses.

“You look at his overall form and those odds were outrageous. It was a grossly over-exaggerated price for the horse’s chance. He doesn’t have bad form.”

Emerald Kingdom’s form backs up Heathcote’s statement.

Earlier in his career Emerald Kingdom won five in a row … few horses achieve that. Add to that the fact that he ran fifth in the Recognition Stakes, second in the Lough Neagh, third in the Buffering, first in the Sunshine Coast Cup … and he clearly was not shown the respect he deserved in the betting markets on Saturday.

It will be interesting to see how those same market strategists handle Emerald Kingdom moving forward and it also remains to be seen whether jockey Robbie Fradd retains the ride on Emerald Kingdom for the big race. Fradd has won five out of six rides on the gelding and he received praise from Heathcote for his ride in the BRC Sprint.

“With a horse like Emerald Kingdom you can’t fight for the lead. He is not that type of horse.

“Robbie Fradd knows the horse well,” said Heathcote. “but, more importantly, he understands the horse. He also has the experience to understand that if they are going fast enough, he will take the trail, or, if they are not going fast enough, he will take him to the lead … and he summed it up beautifully on Saturday.”

Heathcote has not so fond memories of his previous attempts to land the Stradbroke.

“It is a race that I feel I have had nicked off me once or twice of the years with Woorim and with Buffering finishing runner-up twice. Woorim was the one I thought was desperately unlucky. He just needed to get to the outside, but he didn’t and he went to the line untouched.”

But Saturday June 12 will be a whole new Stradbroke ball-game.

The old adage … if you got a ticket you have got a chance … will apply.

Emerald Kingdom proved that on Saturday to the degree that, whatever his odds come Stradbroke day, his form is sure to get more scrutiny than it did in the lead-up to the BRC Sprint.

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