SERIOUSLY, WHO WOULD BET AGAINST BLAKE SHINN?

By Graham Potter | Friday, June 7, 2024

It is an overused description and not always accurate, but to say a jockey is riding in their best career form ... or as well as ever ... is a ‘spot on’ comment when it is applied to Blake Shinn at this time.

Seriously, who would bet against Shinn right now?

Shinn has reeled in two Group 1 victories over the last two Saturdays at Doomben during the Queensland Winter Racing Carnival, excelling with a superb front-running ride aboard Bois D’argent in the Group 1 Doomben Cup on May 25 ... rating a 2000m race in such an inch perfect fashion is no easy feat ... before following that up with Warmonger’s run for the ages in that amazing 10.40 length romp in the Group 1 Queensland Derby on June 1.

And it wasn’t as if Shinn had been handed a top fancied ride on either of those occasions.

Bois D’argent started at $26. Warmonger was a $10 chance.

A further three winners over the last six days has confirmed that Shinn’s form remains on the boil and, apart from bringing his top tier level of expertise to his next Group 1 mission ... the Group 1 Queensland Oaks at Eagle Farm on Saturday ...he can also be expected to, quite justifiably, arrive with his game brimming full of confidence.

Shinn will ride the New Zealand bred Molly Bloom in the Queensland Oaks for the training partnership of Lance O’Sullivan and Andrew Scott.

Molly Bloom is currently the $5 second favourite for the big race, behind Chris Waller’s Scarlet Oak who tops the board at $3.60.

When these two runners clashed last time out in the Group 2 The Roses, Scarlet Oak came out on top beating Molly Bloom by 2.30 lengths under the same weight conditions at which they will meet on Saturday (level weights).

It should be noted that while Scarlet Oak got the run of the race in The Oaks, except for momentarily being inconvenienced at the top of the straight, Molly Bloom was held wide throughout the running and cornered all of eight wide on the home turn.

That is not to say the result would have been any different had Molly Bloom enjoyed a more comfortable run, but it does suggest that she is capable of getting closer to Scarlet Oak.

Scarlet Oak was third up there. Molly Bloom was second up and, with The Oaks distance being 200m further than the 2000m of The Roses, a couple of changing fitness and distance variables come into play which could contribute to setting up a rousing finish between these two runners.

Standing between Shinn and another Group 1 win though is not only Scarlet Oak, who has won three out of four starts, but her rider James McDonald, who is fresh from landing that massive international Group 1 success aboard Romantic Warrior in Japan last weekend.

Of course, McDonald is a rival and a half in any contest, but that does not negate the 'who woiuld bet against Shinn' argument.

The possibility of seeing Shinn and McDonald fighting for supremacy in a driving finish to the line is certainly a stirring prospect in its own right.

Not that their two runners have the race to themselves, but, if they do rise to the top and emerge from the pack together, what a carnival highlight moment their battle would be!

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