After deciding to wait an extra week with stakes winning filly Mildred, trainer Grahame Begg is confident she is now up to the mark and ready to return in the Group Three Chairman’s Stakes at Caulfield.
In her three starts to date, Mildred has won Melbourne’s first two-year-old race of the season over 900m in September and first stakes race of 2019/20 for juveniles, the Maribyrnong Trial Stakes.
The filly has not raced since finishing fifth in the Inglis Banner at The Valley at her only other start in October.
Begg will let her form determine whether she heads to the Group One Blue Diamond Stakes (1200m) on February 22.
Mildred was bought by Begg’s father Neville as a yearling and given the stable nickname for the Neville Begg-trained champion mare Emancipation.
The father and son combined to win the 2018 Blue Diamond with Written By ridden by Jordan Childs who will be aboard Mildred.
Grahame Begg believes Mildred can make her presence felt in Saturday’s Chairman’s (1000m) after deciding to bypass last Saturday’s Blue Diamond Preview for fillies.
“We’ll just let her form tell us where she’s at,” Begg said.
“I’d be expecting her to run well on Saturday and will be disappointed if she doesn’t.
“It’s 1000 metres first-up which should be perfect.
“We’ve waited for the Chairman’s because I just thought she needed an extra week from when she trialled at Pakenham (January 14).
“She’s had two course proper gallops in the last 10 days which has cleaned her up nicely.
“She just maybe got away on me a little bit but then when I galloped her on Saturday morning she really pulled up well in the wind, so she’s right to go on Saturday.”
Mildred is among 25 nominations for the Chairman’s.
The powerful Ciaron Maher and David Eustace stable has five juveniles nominated but Eustace said Ideas Man was likely to be their only runner.
While Mildred would have had to give weight to her rivals in the fillies Preview, Begg said she was also not that well-advantaged taking on the colts in the Chairman’s.
“But we just felt it was probably the right race for her and it might lead her into something like the Talindert Stakes in a couple of weeks time,” he said.
“I really think she’s still developing. But she’s very professional in everything she’s done.”
Credit: AAP