There have been times in the last twelve months when leading harness racing trainer Robert Dunn has began to wonder if the smart three three year old Alta Las Vegas is cursed with bad luck.
The son of Bettor's Delight has always looked an elite level racehorse from the time he ran a close second in last seasons Sapling Stakes to Chase The Dream but a series of setbacks have stopped the talented three year old from building the race record that he is so obviously capable of.
Robert is hoping the bad luck is now firmly behind him.
" We just about lost him as a two year old."
" John had to rush him to the vets in the middle of the night when he became really ill."
" We never really got to the bottom of what the problem was but it completely curtailed his two year old season."
" This season he was building nicely heading into the Auckland Christmas carnival when he slipped coming off the float and struck himself."
"It needed quite a few stitches and meant he missed the $200,000 yearling sale pace so his luck has been all bad todate," Robert told Harnesslink this morning.
Given time to get over his latest setback, Alta Las Vegas impressed trackwatchers at the Franklin workouts last Saturday, cutting out the 2050 metres event in a 2:01 mile rate with closing sectionals of 56 and 27 and still looked to have more to offer.
" He went super at the workouts last weekend and has improved off that so I think he will be very hard to beat tonight at Alexandra Park."
" The only query I have is there is a bit of virus going around Pukekohe and I have had to scratch a couple but he has had the okay from the vet so we should be fine," Robert said.
Safely through tonight, Robert has some big plans for Alta Las Vegas.
"We have always thought that he was good enough to beat the best ones around so we have an ambitious program mapped out for him."
" There is a $30,000 race for him at the end of the month at Alexandra Park and then we are targeting the Northern Derby, New Zealand Derby, and the Harness Jewels so we are hoping his bad luck is behind him and we get to see the real Alta Las Vegas, " Robert said.
Robert in our experience is never one to build up a horse unless he deserves it so Alta Las Vegas is a horse to keep safe in all the big three year old classics coming up
Harnesslink Media