Built for speed

Built For Glory (Bettor’s Delight) trained by Steve and Amanda Telfer seems to have benefited from being gelded.

“He got gelded this time in so he’s changed a lot. With him being a gelding he’s not so heavy. He travelled down with two fillies and didn’t seem to care,” said stable junior driver Nikita Burton after the four year old won narrowly at Wyndham today.

From the get-go the mile race was turbo charged with Built For Glory and Macandrew Aviator keen on leading.

“I was reasonably confident I wanted to lead after his trial last week. He gave me a great feeling and he was awesome today. He got a bit keen and decided he wanted to lead himself. When Hayden (Hayden Douglas driving Macandrew Aviator) dropped back he got a wee breather, then he was off again.”

After speeding through the first 600 metres, Built For Glory showed plenty of tenacity at the business end of the race, holding off a late charge from Always Dreaming with the mile cut out in a sizzling 1-53.1.

BUILT FOR GLORY REPLAY

“It didn’t feel as though we were going that fast. The track was very quick and for a little horse he’s got quite a big stride.”

At the finish Built For Glory had a half a head to spare on a late arriving Always Dreaming.

“It was quite good because it kept him on the job and he got going again.”

The winning time of 1-53.1 was outside the entire’s and geldings record of 1-52.5 held by Machs Back and the all-comers record of 1-51.8 held by Darling Me.

It was a great training effort by the Telfers. Built For Glory last raced in April and had just two trials leading into today’s testing mile.

“Mandy was very confident. He’s been working on well.”

It was also a very mature drive from Burton who quickly summed up the horsepower she was driving and didn’t hand up to her tighter assessed challenger.

Today’s win was penalty free and was the horse’s seventh in twenty four starts. Five of those wins have been in Southland with two wins on the Winton track and one each at Wyndham, Gore and Invercargill.

His biggest win was in last year’s Group Two Alabar Southern Supremacy Stakes when he beat stablemate Double Jeopardy by half a head.

For complete race results, click here.

by Bruce Stewart, for Harnesslink