Leading trainers Greg and Skye Bond will be making a last-ditch bid to qualify the inexperienced but highly-promising four-year-old Taroona Bromac for a start in the $200,000 Retravision Golden Nugget on Friday week by winning the Westral Outdoor Patio Blinds Pace at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
An impressive performance by Taroona Bromac will strengthen his claims for inclusion in the Golden Nugget field. Leading reinsman Ryan Warwick will handle Taroona Bromac from the No. 2 barrier on the back line in Friday night’s 2130m event and the New Zealand-bred gelding should prove too smart for the opposition, which includes Braeview Bondi, Fake News and After Lunch.
Taroona Bromac raced four times in New Zealand for three wins and a second and has had six starts in Western Australia for five wins the first three in effortless fashion in modest company at Kellerberrin and the other two when he set the pace and scored by 13m from Robb Stark over 2130m at Gloucester Park and when leading and beating Whoswhointhezoo by four lengths over 2185m at Pinjarra on Monday afternoon, with a final quarter in a sizzling 26.3sec.
The only glitch in Taroona Bromac’s form is his 11th placing behind Theo Aviator in the 2130m group 2 Four-Year-Old Championship two starts ago. He started from the outside of the back line, raced in eighth position in the one-wide line before starting a three-wide move 950m from home and moving into sixth place at the bell.
However, he made little impression with the third 400m section of the final mile in 27.9sec. He battled on to finish four lengths behind the winner.
The Michael Brennan-trained Braeview Bomber makes strong appeal as the toughest rival for Taroona Bromac on Friday night. The New Zealand-bred five-year-old worked hard in the breeze for much of the way when a fighting second to the pacemaker Just Makemine Diamonds over 2536m last Friday week when the final three quarters whizzed by in 28.9sec., 27.6sec. and 28.8sec.
Fake News, an Alta Christiano mare prepared by Gary Hall Snr, will start out wide at barrier eight at her first appearance as a four-year-old. A winner at seven of her 22 starts, Fake News impressed in a 2185m trial at Pinjarra on Sunday morning when she sat behind the pacemaker Twilight Saga before dashing to the front 100m from the finish and winning by more than two lengths, with final quarters of 28.7sec. and 28.1sec.
The lightly-raced After Lunch bounced back to form last Friday night when she raced in sixth position, burst to the front with 750m to travel and won by more than four lengths from Minimum Wage in modest company. She will start from barrier five.
Ken Casellas