Quinn hoping southern celebrations continue

[Wandering Eyes]

Niall Quinn’s Wanganui stable again promises to be a force to be reckoned with at Riccarton on Saturday.

He savoured success on the opening day of the Grand National meeting and will be hoping for the celebrations to continue and cap off a grand week.

“We really enjoy Riccarton and try to bring the best of our team down here,” Quinn said.

“They look after us really well and do an exceptional job, the hospitality has been grand and made us feel so welcome.”

Quinn produced Hidalgo to score over jumps at the first time of asking last Saturday and the son of Pure Champion will attempt to make it two on the bounce in the Speight’s Ultra Tap 0-1 Win Hurdle (3100m).

“He has done really well and will continue to improve,” Quinn said.

“It won’t be as easy on Saturday with the improved track conditions and obviously Duke Of Plumpton and Doctor Iris are good horses.

“He’s a new boy and it’s a nice next step for him and his future.”

Stablemate Mr Fahrenheit will take a consistent form line into the Hospitality NZ Canterbury Grand National Hurdles (4200m).

The son of Zed has yet to break through over fences after multiple placings and will face a step up in grade after running fourth behind Hidalgo on the opening day.

“He will really like the extra trip, he has trained on really well and has a good group of owners from the South Island who are keen on jumps racing,” Quinn said.

They include Allan Stalker, who prepared Joint Effort to win the 2010 edition of the National.

“Allan does a lot of the pre-training with this bloke and he’s a very genuine horse, I think he deserves his chance to be there and anything can happen,” Quinn said.

Off the back of the jumping events, Quinn will look to his Gr.3 Winter Cup (1600m) runner-up Who Knows to go one better in the Heatstore Open Handicap (1800m).

“It was a very good field and I didn’t think she could win fresh-up over a mile in a Group Three, but we were expecting a pretty good run after being happy with her work going into it,” he said.

Who Knows has won four of her 14 starts and her southern sojourn will stand her in good stead for the future.

“We really wanted trip give her a good trip away to help her mature a bit more, although she’s a six-year-old she is still relatively new to the whole thing,” Quinn said.

“We’ll reassess her when she gets home and look at future targets.”

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