EF JAN 23 - NO EXCUSES FROM NOLAN

By Graham Potter | Sunday, January 24, 2010

As inevitable as it is in real terms, the defeat that brings an end to an extended, unbeaten run of a superior racehorse has to be tinged with disappointment for the connections of that beaten racehorse.

That was the case when the four-year-old mare Chakvetadze surrendered her proud record at Eagle Farm on Saturday. Unbeaten in seven starts over a period of sixteen months prior to this latest outing, Chakvetadze, after leading early, had nothing left to offer when swamped by horses late in the running.

She eventually finished sixth out of the seven runners, 2.80 lengths behind the winner Plain Magic. The only horse to finish behind her was the 301-1 chance Welcome Site.

While he might have been licking his wounds, trainer Michael Nolan was philosophical about the result, keen to learn from the outcome and looking ahead to a rematch with the winner, the Kelly Schweida trained Plain Magic.

Trainer Michael Nolan (speaking directly after the race): “I’m not offering anything up as an excuse, but yeah we have got to try and look at what we could have done better. She’s had a long time between runs (five weeks since her comeback win in December and she was out of action for six-and-a-half months before that).

“We rode her forward which, in hindsight, was probably not the thing to do ... but you don’t know that at the time. She probably went a bit hard early, so there are a couple of things there we can probably work on and maybe ... maybe turns things around in two weeks (when Chakvetadze and Plain Magic could clash again in a Quality Handicap over 1200m at Doomben).

“The track’s very hard ... real hard, but I’m not throwing that up as an excuse. They all had to go through it.

“Look, we’ve been beaten and we’ve been beaten out of a place and that’s that. It’s disappointing to get beaten. Don’t get me wrong. It is a hollow feeling, you know, but the monkey is off our back a bit now. There is not the pressure there anymore of getting nine out of nine or ten out of ten.

“She wasn’t disgraced. She gave Plain Magic 4.5kg here. I think if she is handicapped a little bit better for her next run we could turn the result around with Plain Magic ... you know if Plain Magic goes up in weight and we come down, we can turn it around.”

*A post-race examination of Chakvetadze revealed the mare to be lame in the near foreleg.

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