Georgie Catania will be one of three familiar faces missing from Spreyton on Sunday as she takes a break to freshen up before night racing resumes in a fortnight.
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Catania, who won her second race for the new season on Kuusela last week, is taking some time off to catch up with family in Melbourne.
The jockey is coming off a busy period as she’s been riding trackwork at both Brighton and Seven Mile Beach six days a week.
Trainer Scott Brunton has been relying heavily on her services in the absence of stable jockey David Pires who hurt his knee while on holidays.
Pires will miss another meeting on Sunday and Chantal Willis is also sidelined after breaking her collarbone in a race fall.
Catania had two rides for Brunton last weekend and as well as winning on Kuusela was beaten only a nose on Flikpix.
With continued support from the leading trainer, she is hoping she might achieve one of her career goals this season – finishing top five on the jockeys’ table.
“My other goal is to win one of our major races,” she said.
SETTLER’S STONE is in danger of being balloted from another lead-up race as he tries to qualify for the Melbourne Cup.
The Troy Blacker-trained gelding is only third emergency for the Sofitel Girls’ Day Out Handicap (1700m) at Flemington on Saturday.
Settler’s Stone was also balloted from a race at Caulfield on September 2 and instead had to run at Moonee Valley last Saturday to keep his campaign on track.
Blacker was hoping to run the six-year-old this week as a lead-up to the JRA Cup at Moonee Valley on September 29 and the Bart Cummings at Flemington on October 7.
The Bart Cummings carries automatic entry to the Melbourne Cup and would give Settler’s Stone his only chance of making the cup field.
“The horse is going well – we just need to get some runs into him,” Blacker said.
“He ran really good first-up then had to be ridden a tad close the other day because that was the way the track was playing.”
SYDNEY sprinter Redzel has been selected for a slot in The Everest at Randwick next month, which is welcome news for at least one Tasmanian.
The gelding has a big list of owners and one of them is from Launceston.
With total stakemoney of $10 million, The Everest is the world’s richest race on turf.
TASMANIAN gelding Ignatius was the 10th highest stake-winning two-year-old in Australia last season.
The Todd Rattray-trained pacer won five of his six starts and $110,000.
He had the fastest winning time of the top 20 juveniles, going 1:51.3 to win the group 1 Breeders Challenge final at Menangle.
