Alabama Lass Extends NZB Filly of the Year Lead

Exciting filly Alabama Lass (Alabama Express) opened up a commanding early lead in the NZB Filly of the Year Series with victory in Saturday’s $175,000 Group Two Windsor Park Stud Soliloquy Stakes (1400m) at Ellerslie.

Two of the 11 races in this season’s NZB Filly of the Year Series have been run, and Alabama Lass has won them both. She now has 14 points to her name, with Kitty Flash (Ace High) a distant second on 4.

A nine-length winner on debut and Group Two-placed in her only other two-year-old appearance, Alabama Lass has begun her three-year-old season brilliantly with wins in all of her first three starts. She won by three and a half lengths first-up at Taupo on August 21, then kicked off the NZB Filly of the Year Series on a winning note in the Group Three Gold Trail Stakes (1200m) at Hastings on September 7.

Alabama Lass faced a new test with the step up to 1400 metres for the Soliloquy on Saturday, and she also had to jump from the widest gate in a field of nine. But once again she came out on top.

Alabama Lass showed explosive speed out of the gates, taking a clear lead and getting across to the rail inside the first 100 metres. She and jockey Sam Spratt dictated terms for most of the race from that point on, and they rounded the turn with a clear advantage.

But just when it looked like the rest of the field was struggling to catch her, Alabama Lass started to drift sideways and the chasers began to close in.

Kitty Flash and Love Poem (Snitzel) both got close, but Alabama Lass had enough up her sleeve to hold on and win by just over a length.

“She was explosive out of the gates,” Spratt said. “I was pretty much on the fence within the first 50 metres.

“She didn’t corner the greatest, and then she was a bit of a rascal and tried to go bush down the straight. This was her first time racing that way around, so hopefully she’ll learn from it.

“If she hadn’t run out, I think she would have won easily. She wasn’t coming to the end of it at all. I think it was just the fact that she was running out. If she’d kept going straight, she would have trotted in.”

The Ken and Bev Kelso-trained Alabama Lass has now had five starts for four wins and a placing, earning $234,750 for her seven owners.

The third leg of the NZB Filly of the Year Series is the $550,000 Group One Barneswood Farm New Zealand 1000 Guineas (1600m) at Riccarton on November 16, which is worth 12 points to the winner, with 7 for second and 3.5 for third.

“She really can ping the gates and put herself forward, and she did that today,” Ken Kelso said. “It’s pretty hard running into that headwind down the straight, so she probably was entitled to knock up a little bit in that last bit.

“But we are going to give serious thought about whether we go to Riccarton or not. We’ve got other alternatives, and the Railway (Group One, 1200m) is one in particular that I’m thinking about.

“Seeing out the mile is definitely a concern that we have in terms of the Guineas. She’s a real speed freak.

“Maybe she wasn’t as dominant today because she drew out wide and had to do that work early, and that headwind may have been another factor. We’ll let the dust settle and work it out.”