3 minute read
Exciting sprinter Lim’s Craft made quick amends from his last-start defeat with a pulsating win in the $70,000 Class 3 race over 1200m on Friday night.
The awkward alley was pointed at as the main conviction for the second place that halted his three-in-a-row bid in a similar race three weeks ago, even if he lost no marks behind the equally talented Fame Star, but from barrier No 3 this time around, the Smart Missile four-year-old settled closer to the pacesetters, smothered up in between runners.
Into the straight, the odds-on favourite ($8) was peeled out by Benny Woodworth as the fresh horse on the scene. Excelling (Vlad Duric), who had already mastered race-leader Charger (Zyrul Nor Azman) upon cornering, fought back as best as he could, but was clearly no match when Lim's Craft rocked up with a sizzling turn of foot on the outside.
Trainer Steven Burridge's promising galloper went on to defeat Excelling by 1 ¾ lengths with Charger plugging away for third place another three-quarter length away. The winning time was 1min 9.74secs for the 1200m on the Short Course.
"This is how you'd like to see him win," said Burridge, obviously still smarting from Lim's Craft 's luckless run last time out.
"We always thought he had plenty of upsides, the way he did it tonight was very good.
"We'll have to step him up, probably in Class 2 and over further as well. Benny is riding with full of confidence at the moment, he came out at the right time."
The Malaysian jockey, who is making a bold bid to reel in current leader Vlad Duric, was able to knock one win off the two-time Singapore champion jockey's 12-win lead given he had bagged another race earlier with $12 favourite Prince Pegasus in the $30,000 Class 5 Division 2 race over 1600m, and Duric rode only one winner, $9 favourite Gros Piton in the $30,000 Class 5 Division 1 race over 1100m.
Duric's lead on Woodworth now stands at 11 winners (66 versus 55), and with only 15 meetings left in the season, Woodworth's mission to draw level is still within the realms of possibility.
While suitably impressed with his 55th winner, he would not go so far as label him as something out of the box yet.
"Is he very, very good? No, but he does feel like a very good horse. Very, very good is Group 1 material, and he's not quite there yet," he said.
"From barrier three tonight compared to barrier 11 last time, half the battle was won. Last time, we had to jostle for position from the wide barrier and he had too much ground to make up.
"Tonight, he got the right runs and he went around horses, he was hanging in, but he still ran past them quickly."
In only eight starts, Lim's Craft, the second Smart Missile progeny to win on Friday after Hugo earlier (see earlier report), has already seen his prizemoney snowball close to $170,000 for the Lim's Stable.
