Smart Sprinter Up Against Weight Dilemma

Trainer Trevor Rowe is confident his gun sprinter Smart Image can produce another heroic effort with a huge weight at Cluden Park on Friday.

But Rowe says a win with the huge impost of 66.5kg in the Ladbrokes Open Hcp (1000m) will virtually weight the gelding out of northern racing.

The Smart Missile seven-year-old will give away as much as 12.5kg to three of the six runners in the race.

“I think he can run them down and win but if he does it leaves us with a big headache. Where do we go then?,” Rowe said.

“Again we were told he’d get around 64kg, but when the weights came out it was 66.5kg. What do you do put on a heavy weight jockey or an apprentice and 10kg of lead.

“We’ve got Ash Butler on him. He’s heavy and knows the horse so well. Even with that weight I still expect him to go very close.”

Rowe, who trains in partnership with his son Peter in Cairns, has won nine races with Smart Image since the gelding joined the stable two years ago as a three time Sydney winner and Brisbane winner.

During a golden run of form over two seasons, Smart Image has become the highest rated sprinter in the North after a series of impressive wins including a BM85 Handicap with 60kg at Eagle Farm  almost a year ago to the day.

But the talented galloper’s reputation went to a new level when he lumped a whopping 65.5kg to a fast finishing victory over 1000m at Cluden in June.

It was thought to be the biggest weight carried to a win at Cluden in recent memory, outside the old amateurs weight scale.

Burdened by big weights, Smart Image was again a major contender  during the north’s winter carnivals but failed to claim a major.

He finished fourth in the Cleveland Bay Hcp and was a close second in the Cairns Amateurs Sprint.

Rowe says the seven-year-old has come back after a short spell in top shape and is “flying” despite a first-up flop on a wet track at Doomben in the Listed George Moore Stakes.

“He’s good. He just didn’t handle that heavy track in Brisbane at all,” Rowe said.

“He was vetted after the race and there was nothing and when I took him back to his stable afterwards he’d eaten up within an hour.

“I also have my doubts that he likes the big stable environment in Brisbane.

“He’s a much better horse at home where it’s much more relaxed and laid back.

“I was going to keep him down in Brisbane for a 1300m race this week but in the end I was so disappointed with his first up run I thought I’d get him back here. He was back here the week after his run down there.

“I galloped him yesterday and he’s flying. I think he’ll finish too hard for them even with this weight. The headache we’ll have if he’s good enough to win is what we do next.

“The only horse I can recall winning with that sort of weight up here was The Harrovian who won with 67kg in Cairns (April 2020).

“Unfortunately, good horses are weighted out of races up here. It’s a shame because we need good horses to promote racing.”

The Ladbrokes Open is the main race on a bumper 10-event card at Cluden which kicks off at 11.20am.