Leading trainer Alwin Tan may well have unearthed something out of the box in Nova Swiss after the former New Zealander simply decimated his rivals in the $60,000 Open Benchmark 67 race over 1000m on Sunday.
Already an impressive winner on debut three weeks back, the two-time winner back home was never in doubt from the moment his jockey Manoel Nunes parked him in an ideal spot outside leader Eatons Gold (Shafiq Rizuan).
Coming to the 400m mark, Nova Swiss ($7) had not raised a sweat, with Nunes clearly toying with the opposition. The Brazilian jockey was still not budging while his rivals were all under pressure.
The moment he gave a squeeze, Nova Swiss exploded away and the race was as good as over from the 200m mark. The Swiss Ace three-year-old went on to score by four lengths from Host The Nation (Saifudin Ismail) with Elise (Benny Woodworth) third another half-length away.
The winning time was 58.92secs for the 1000m on the Polytrack.
“I’ve had a bit of luck with those new sprinters and it looks like Nova Swiss is another one of them,” said Tan.
“Manoel wanted to ride him handy and things worked out the way he planned. He just sat back and when he went for him, the horse was way too good.
“He seems to be above average, but for now I’ll stick to Polytrack. He won on turf in New Zealand, and I will definitely run him on turf one day, but probably next year.
“I haven’t set any target for him, but I guess a race like the Merlion Trophy could be a realistic long-term race for him.”
The Group 2 Merlion Trophy is a 1200m race on Polytrack and kicks off the Singapore Sprint Series which culminates with the Group 1 Lion City Cup (1200m) in April.
Nunes said Nova Swiss was for sure a brilliant prospect but still had it all to do in terms of racing maturity.
“He’s a lovely horse, but he’s still not 100% mature. There is still a bit of growing to do, but from the way he’s won two from two, he’s definitely got a bright future here,” said Nunes.
“Today, he was travelling so well and it was just a matter of waiting before pushing the button.”
In two starts, Nova Swiss has now won both for stakes money in excess of $65,000 for the Nova Racing Stable.
