Te Rapa ideal fit for smart mare

Multiple stakes winner No More Tears will have a number of factors in her favour when she kicks off a new campaign aimed at two Group One goals.

The Cambridge galloper is on target to begin her four-year-old season in the Gr.2 Lisa Chittick Foxbridge Plate on Saturday.

“That’s going to be a hot field, but she doesn’t mind the cut out of the ground and she loves Te Rapa,” trainer Stephen Marsh said.

“She’ll run there and all going well she will go to Hawke’s Bay for the first two races down there.”

The Gr.1 Makfi Challenge Stakes will be run at Hastings on August 27 with the Gr.1 Windsor Park Plate three weeks later.

The dual Listed winner of the Hamilton Vets Equine Stakes and the Soliloquy Stakes, No More Tears added the Gr.3 Mr Tiz Trophy to her record before a three start autumn campaign in Sydney where she finished runner-up in the Gr.3 James Carr Stakes.

Meanwhile, Marsh has confirmed her exciting younger stablemate Ugo Foscolo’s path to the Gr.1 Sothys New Zealand 2000 Guineas at Riccarton on November 5.

“He will kick off at Hastings on the first day in the El Roca Sprint for three-year-olds and then go on to the Hawke’s Bay Guineas and the 2000 Guineas,” Marsh said.

“You might give a lot of horses three runs before they went into the Guineas, but with this one I’m happy to go third-up – he’s very clean-winded and athletic.”

Ugo Foscolo was a commanding debut winner at Rotorua in April and the following month he got the better of Memories Only in the Listed Hamilton Vets Equine Stakes at Te Rapa.

“He’s coming up nicely and I can’t fault him at this stage,” Marsh said.

“He’s definitely grown and matured both mentally and physically, there’s been a big improvement in him.”