Ken Casellas | Photo: Hamilton Content Creators
Promising black gelding Whos The Dad produced a sample of his ability when he finished strongly to score an easy victory in the 2130m Beau Rivage Pace at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
“He is capable of measuring up to the State’s good three-year-olds,” declared an optimistic stand-in trainer Hayden Charles after Shannon Suvaljko had driven Whos Your Dad three back on the pegs in fifth position before easing the gelding off the pegs with 550m to travel and bringing him home with a powerful burst four-wide burst to hit the front at the 60m mark on his way to beating the pacemaker and $2.10 favourite Paul Edward by almost two lengths, with Goodfellaz ($2.65) a close-up third.
Charles, deputising for his father, Hopeland trainer Kevin Charles, said that Whos The Dad had shown plenty of early promise which saw him set the pace and win a heat of the two-year-old Pearl from The Miki Taker 12 months ago before drawing the back line and finishing an unlucky seventh behind the classy The Miki Taker in the $100,000 final of the Pearl.
“Whos The Dad worked very well on Tuesday, and we expected a good showing tonight,” said Charles, who was deputising as the trainer of the gelding while his father was enjoying a holiday in Singapore.
Kevin Charles and his wife Annette bred and own Whos The Dad, who was passed in at the 2020 APG Perth yearling sale after failing to reach his reserve price of $25,000. The gelding is by American stallion Betting Line and is out of the New South Wales-bred Rock N Roll Heaven mare Glenferrie Clan, and he now has earned $42,541 from five wins and eight placings from 26 starts.
The unraced Glenferrie Clan is a daughter of former star pacing mare Tupelo Rose, who retired with a fine record of 101 starts for 35 wins, 25 placings and stakes of $879,867.