Flak Jacket and jockey Lester Grace after Saturday's win at Kembla Grange. Picture: ADAM McLEAN
Flak Jacket's pedigree suggests he will handle the step up in class with ease, but Grahame Begg will reluctantly start the blueblood in the Canonbury Stakes after his win at Kembla Grange on Saturday.
A full brother to Group 1-winning sprinter Shellscrape and multiple stakes winner Red Tracer, the Dane Shadow colt swamped his rivals to win the juveniles Maiden Plate (1000 metres) on debut.
Flak Jacket was fitted with just the one Randwick barrier trial prior to stepping out as a $3.70 favourite for a race Begg described was intended to be "more like a trial".
The Randwick horseman felt he had no option but to target the Canonbury Stakes (1100m) at Rosehill in a fortnight, a race lined with classy Golden Slipper hopefuls.
"That's the only race he can run in - there are no other races the horse could possibly run in in the next month really," Begg said.
"It's the right distance, time's right so he'll have to go there.
"Unfortunately you can't take them through their grades any more. It would be nice to run him in a no metropolitan win race, but there's none on.
"They're forcing you from a 1000-metre maiden straight into a Listed race."
Flak Jacket, raced by prominent breeders Geoff and Mary Grimish, preserved broodmare Kisma's 100 per cent record of horses that have made it to the track as winners.
Despite Flak Jacket having a head start on his racing career, Begg maintained he would adopt a safety-first approach with the horse as inevitable comparisons begin to be drawn.
"Without winding him right up we were using [Saturday] as another stepping stone," he said. "It was going to be more like a trial and if they're good horses they'll measure up.
"Being a wet track and both of them [Shellscrape and Red Tracer] quite adept in soft ground, we had no fears about running him on a heavy track at his first start in a race."
High-flying apprentice Lester Grace used his two-kilogram claim to angle Flak Jacket to the outside of the field down the long Kembla straight, wearing down Gai Waterhouse's debutant Spud O'Reilly ($5.20). David Payne's Rutherglen ($15) was a close-up third.
Second elect Miss Cheeky Charli ($4.90) was slowly away and eased out of the race a furlong out from home.
Meantime, Begg said he would scope the possibility of bringing Group 1-winning Secret Admirer to Kembla for an exhibition gallop between races on Saturday.
