Perfect Major, beaten in three recent trials, relished the challenge of strong competitive racing when he scored a convincing first-up victory in the 2536m Simmonds Steel Pace at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
Starting from the outside barrier in the field of seven and at the attractive tote odds of $4.20, Perfect Major was sent forward, three wide, after 300m to move to the breeze, with noted frontrunner Extradite ($4.40) setting the pace.
Chris Voak was content to remain in the breeze until he sent Perfect Major to the front 320m from home on his way to victory by a length from stablemate Kiwi Bloke, with Stefsbest, the third of trainer Ross Olivieri’s four runners, a short half-head away in third place.
The final 800m was covered in 56.9sec. and Perfect Major rated 1.56.1.
“We had the positive and the negative,” said Olivieri. “The negative was that his trials were ordinary, and the positive was that we know he goes better in his races. He knows the difference between a trial and a race, and he races like Perfect Major is capable of racing. Judged by his trials he could have run third or fourth. Voaky felt in the preliminary that he felt like he had a horse.”
Perfect Major, who has won at six of his ten WA starts for an overall record of 36 starts for 14 wins, 11 placings and stakes of $169,134, showed plenty of promise in feature open-class events last summer when he finished fifth in the WA Pacing Cup and won the RWWA Cup from Chicago Bull.
Olivieri said that immaturity and inexperienced had prevented Perfect Major from even better results, and he is planning to toughen up the five-year-old in preparation for next summer’s rich Cup events.
“He is going to get seasoned to the Free-For-All grind,” said Olivieri. “I want to give him a couple of races in his class and then put him in Free-For-Alls so that he can get used to racing against those tough grinding horses like Vultan Tin and other horses who front up, week-in and week-out, to do the hard yards.
“Perfect Major will be a better horse in the next Fremantle and WA Pacing Cups. He was very good when fifth in the Pacing Cup last December when he and the other horse (To Fast To Serious) who were racing for the first time in the big time loomed up but didn’t go on with it.
“I thought Perfect Major was going to win about 400m out, and so did Voaky. But the lack of experiencing the grind of Free-For-All racing told.”
by Ken Casellas