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Emerging stars and upcoming winners from Australian racing over the past week.
Woman (Canterbury, September 13): When your parents have won 18 Group 1 races between them there are bound to be high expectations. But Frankel-More Joyous filly Woman took at least the first step towards delivering when making a winning debut.
A heavily-backed favourite in the three-year-old fillies’ maiden over 1250m on the strength of a dominant trial win, the Waterhouse/Bott-trained filly sat midfield before jockey Kerrin McEvoy asked her for an effort approaching the home turn. Taking some time to wind up, Woman hit her straps on straightening and overhauled her rivals to score eased down by two lengths.With her best work coming in the latter stages, the filly looks likely to improve as the distances increase and with a first up Timeform rating of 92p she looks bound for better things. Woman holds nominations for upcoming feature races including the Thousand Guineas and Caulfield Classic so looks a likely spring carnival player.
Paret (Canterbury, September 13): One race after Woman made her winning debut, Paret followed suit with a career-opening victory in a three-year-old colts and geldings maiden over 1250m.
Trained by Chris Waller, the Harbour Watch colt hadn’t sparkled at the barrier trials but stepped up as a horse of promise when overcoming traffic problems with a fast-finishing three-quarter-length victory.Settling last in the seven-horse field, Paret was badly strung up behind a wall of horses in the straight and didn’t see daylight until the 150m. Unleashed at that point by Glyn Schofield, the colt showed an impressive turn of foot to quickly overhaul the leaders and win eased down.
Winning in a time close to a second faster than Woman’s, Paret returned a Timeform rating of 96p and with the stable thinking enough of him to nominate for the Caulfield Guineas, he could be a late-emerging contender for some spring stakes races.Hulme (Flemington, September 16): Boom colt Royal Symphony was all the talk after his barnstorming win in the Pin and Win Plate but a look beyond the placegetters reveals another looming winner.
Hulme could muster no early speed and settled at the tail of the field, eventually finding himself with nowhere to go early in the straight.Finally working into the clear at the 250m, the Power colt hit the line hard for a 2.5 length fourth. His last 200m was run in 12.07 seconds, slower only than the winner and runner up Éclair Sunshine.
It was just his second career outing after winning on debut at Wodonga and the eye-catching performance was one of a three-year-old that will improve as the distances increase. He could be one worth following on the path towards the Victoria Derby later this spring.