'DEFIANT' DUO CHASING A UNIQUE DOUBLE

By Graham Potter | Thursday, March 7, 2024

Two $500 000 Jewel races ... a two-year-old and a three-year-old edition ... headline the card at the Gold Coast on Saturday and the two ‘Defiant’ brothers will be looking to give trainer Stuart Kendrick a unique double on the day.

Defiant Boom and Defiant Spirit share the same breeding (Spirit Of Boom – Defiant Dame) and Defiant Boom will be the first in action in the two-year-old edition of The Jewel.

The fact that Defiant Boom is still without a win in three starts could be something of a misleading statistic.

There was certainly plenty to like about his debut run and result at Doomben when he finished second three-quarters-of-a-length behind the more experienced, short priced favourite Wolfgang, who was winning for a second time in a row there.

In his second-up run, Defiant Boom finished third in a race won by Spywire, who would go on to finish third in the $2 million Magic Millions Two-Year-Old Classic ... and, in his last start Defiant Boom had to settle for a minor role again when finishing third, just over a length behind the very smart debut winner All Inclusive in the Two-Year-Old Jewel Prelude.

It is worth noting that the connections of All Inclusive think enough of the gelding to have set him for the Group 2 Todman in Sydney for his second start, which also takes place this Saturday.

That’s not a bad set of results for a non-winner!

No surprise then that Defiant Boom is the race’s second favourite at $5 behind the $4 main fancy Mishani Lily who is a two-time winner from four starts.

Defiant Boom will be ridden by Michael Rodd and is set to jump from barrier thirteen.
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Defiant Spirit runs in the three-year-old edition of The Jewel.

Defiant Spirit won on debut and has progressed to be a four-time winner from nine starts.

He was a last start winner ... in the Three-Year-Old Jewel Prelude ... and has a Gold Coast track and distance win behind his name.

That record has earned the Kendrick trained runner a great deal of respect in the betting where he currently tops the boards as the $4.20 favourite.

Highbar ($6), Trifling ($6.50) and Party For Two ($8.50) are the runners labelled to pose the biggest threats to Defiant Spirit, but perhaps his biggest challenge might not come in the form of an opponent, but rather a barrier draw, with Defiant Spirit basically drawing the carpark in barrier twenty.

Weighed against that doubt though is the fact that in the Jewel Prelude also jumped from a wide draw (barrier thirteen) and still won in scintillating fashion, in spite of carrying 59kg and giving a weight advantage of between 1.5kg and 6.5kg to all of his rivals.

The Three-year-Old Jewel is at set weights.

Robbie Dolan, who will be in the saddle again on Saturday, took Defiant Spirit back at the jump in the Prelude ... gave the leaders a nine length start mid-race and then handed all of his opponents a thrashing in the home straight, courtesy of a superb, sustained display of acceleration.

Clearly Defiant Spirit is an exciting prospect facing his next test.

Whether he will be racing to try to complete that unique ‘Defiant’ double will depend on the result of the Two-year-Old Jewel one race earlier, but clearly the prospect is there for it to be a very exciting forty-five minutes for the Stuart Kendrick stable and the connections of the two ‘Defiant’ runners.

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