Leading trainer Alwin Tan always knew a dry patch was inevitable following a red-hot start to the year and that the path to the premiership title was not a sprint but a marathon.
While the first four months of the year had yielded 29 winners for the Singaporean handler, the past two months have been a much quieter affair with just four trips to the winner’s circle as he had to manage the resources in his stable and ensure that his horses returned fresh and ready for an assault in the second half of the season.
A perfect illustration of Tan’s circumstances has been the recent performances of Power Lion, an up-and-coming galloper who showed plenty of promise by winning on his debut in April but has since struggled to recapture that winning form.
But the New Zealand-bred galloper fighting victory in the $60,000 Class 4 race over 1400m on Sunday could be seen as a symbolic one for Tan who hopes it will inject some much-needed impetus back into his bid to become the first local trainer to win the title since Charles Leck finished top of the pile in 2003.
“It’s definitely nice to get another win,” said Tan. “There’s been a bit of pressure building with everyone talking about me leading the premiership and how the other trainers were chasing me and closing the gap.”
This was his 34th victory overall but just his second this month (his last success was two weeks ago with Perfect Charger) and in the past two months, he has seen the likes of eight-time champion trainer Laurie Laxon saddle nine winners to move ominously up the table into second place with 31 winners.
“My horses are a bit high class, after they race they need a bit more time to rest before they’re ready to race again,” said Tan. “Hopefully this leads to a few more winners today.”
Ridden by regular partner Danny Beasley, Power Lion ($12) had too much in the tank down the straight as the bay gelding swept past Scrapper Well (Noh Senari) to win by a half-length with Flying Zero (Manoel Nunes) another length and three-quarters away in third. The winning time on the Long Course was 1min 22.31secs.
Much of Power Lion’s return to winning ways was largely down to the decision to remove the blinkers on the gelding, said Tan.
“His last run was disappointing (when he finished seventh),” he said. “It was raining and the yielding was soft, he didn’t like it and he tends to drift to the outside because he can’t see what’s going on around him
“I took off the blinkers this time so he could look around but even then there was still a bit of hang from him.”
It took the bulky Danroad three-year-old, who was kept in the plum position next to the rails by Beasley, almost an age to get into his stride and for a while it looked like his late charge would fail.
“He’s probably a miler or an 1800m horse,” said the Australian hoop, who also collected his first winner this month. “He ran well in his first start, even at his second start, but he seems to have lost a bit of his dash.
“He does quite a lot wrong this horse, even today. He was very dour and if it was a 1200m race he would have lost it.
“But he’s a strong horse and his strength served him well over the final furlong and he was able to catch the leader at the end. He’ll do better over the longer distances and is actually quite a handy horse.”
With two victories from his four starts, Power Lion has collected just shy of $90,000 in prizemoney for the Power Lion Stable.
