CASTLE AND POETIC DRAMA TOO STRONG AT EAGLE FARM

By Graham Potter | Tuesday, March 28, 2023

Poetic Drama ($4.60) made it two wins out of three starts since transferring to the Tony and Maddysen Sears stable when thumping the opposition in a National Apprentice Series Class 1 Plate over 1600m at Eagle Farm on March 28.

Melea Castle was in the saddle this time and she guided the fortunes of the chestnut mare in superb fashion, in sometimes testing circumstances, as she brought the daughter of Proisir home, upstaging the $2.50 favourite Security Advisor by a clearcut 2.20 length margin.

Poetic Drama didn’t have an easy passage in the early part. While she did jump well in a fairly hectic start ... she briefly held down second spot ... she was quickly shuffled back to fifth spot where she was trapped in-between runners and hard on the heels of Private Banker ($10).

Castle did a good job, showing patience as the field started to take the sweep to the home turn with Poetic Drama travelling well enough, but still some four lengths off the lead.

Once Castle had the opportunity to take the traffic problems out of the equation, she did that by angling Poetic Drama out wider on the track at the 600m mark, at the same time pressing the button for Poetic Drama to go forward.

Poetic Drama did seem to be full of running at that stage, but she just needed to a moment to balance up again after straightening four wide, and then the run home was on in earnest.

The Team Sears trained runner quickly built momentum and, in spite of wanting to run around a bit halfway up the straight, that momentum was strong enough to propel her into the lead by the 200m mark leaving the now hard chasing favourite Security Advisor (Angela Jones) who had been held up at a vital stage when trying to take a run down the inside running rain ... an always possible roadblock Castle had avoided by switching out wide ... with too much to do to catch Poetic Drama, who stormed to the line in telling fashion.

A big win for Castle on a big day out in Brisbane for apprentices.

Castle’s win made it a clean sweep for Queensland apprentices on the day after Jaden Lloyd had earlier taken out the first race in the Brisbane leg of the National Apprentice Series ... a series Queensland would go on to win.

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