Gai Waterhouse | Gai Waterhouse News 56617 Playing By The Rules

Our Racing Manager, Emma Reeves, aids us with programming and identifies who she thinks is the best placed horse each weekend.

Kibou, Saturday 30th September, Royal Randwick, Race 10:

I’d love to go a little bit rogue this week with a horse who’s ready to take it to the next level because I think we have a few to choose from, but I’m going stick to the brief. Kibou is a Group 3 winner who beat eventual Group 1 winner Golden Mile that day, so we’ve always felt he was up to the highest level. He had a year off and returned brilliantly in June of this year. We spelled him after that to get the timing right for a tilt at the $10mil. Golden Eagle in November and he won first up two weeks ago in a race that didn’t go to plan tactically. I don’t think he had any right to win that day, but his talent, grit and determination saw him through. Ordinarily I like to see our horses stepping up in trip but with that first up run under his belt, and if he’s going to shape up into a Golden Eagle horse, he has to be hard to beat here.