Not renowned as a conditioner of two-year-olds, Laurie Laxon landed the third leg of the Singapore Golden Horseshoe Series with newcomer Master King.
Photo by Singapore Turf Club
The Australian-bred gelding earned connections a $15,000 bonus when taking out the $60,000 Inglis Sydney Juvenile Stakes over 1100m on the Polytrack as he was purchased out of the Perth Magic Millions Yearling Sale.
Sent out the $7 favourite, Master King, ridden by Joao Moreira, scored by a length-and-a-half over Jackpot (Erasmus Aslam) with Akubra (Matt Kellady) finishing third, a further six-and-a-quarter lengths away.
The five two-year-olds jumped pretty much as one before Keeping The Faith (Saimee Jumaat) showed good speed to go up and take the lead. Moreira allowed Master King to cruise up into second spot with Jackpot and Tomorrows Dream (Ivaldo Santana) next in line.
Master King was cruising under Moreira to the home turn where he quickly got the measure of Keeping The Faith and opened up a winning break. While Jackpot tried valiantly to cut back the margin he was unable to make too much of an impression.
Akubra, who had been hard ridden in last place before the turn, ran on strongly late while Keeping The Faith got very tired in the final 100m of the contest.
Laxon said it was decided to put the blinkers on Master King at his debut to make him concentrate through the whole race.
“He had a bit of a look around at his first trial so we put blinkers on him for his second one,” said Laxon.
“We didn't want to go taking any chances with him when it came to the race.”
Laxon said Master King wasn't a typical two-year-old and in fact was very well grown and looked more like a three-year-old.
“He's a very strong horse for his age,” said Laxon. “Looking at him you would think he was a three-year-old rather than a two-year-old.
Laxon has never had a large team of two-year-olds to train and Master King is the only youngster currently in his stable.
“They've got to be a good two-year-old to win with me,” said Laxon. “I've never really had a lot of two-year-olds come through my stable.”
Moreira believes Master King can develop into a handy galloper as the youngster has one very important attribute – he doesn't over-race.
“He was a little slow to jump but quickly recovered and races on the outside of the leader,” said Moreira.
“What I liked about him was that when he got outside the leader he didn't want to over-race.
“He was nice and relaxed during the race and that suggests to me he will have no problem getting over a further trip when he gets older.
“Laurie had he nicely prepared for his first race start and it was good to ride another winner for him.”
By Australian Group 3 sprint winner Due Sasso from the Galileo mare Prizegiving, Master King is raced by Patrick Lau and carries the colours made famous by Recast, who won a number of feature races including the 2007 Singapore Gold Cup.
