3 minute read

Ballydoyle look set to send Highland Reel down the same path as last year's Cox Plate winner Adelaide.

Highland Reel is another three-year-old son of super-sire Galileo, but while Adelaide's closest connection to Australia was his name, Highland Reel has strong ties with the land down under, coming from a family very familiar to Australian punters.

Mum, Hveger, is out of Circles Of Gold, making her a sister to Elvstroem and Haradasun. Both were multiple Group 1 winners in Australia, but both came up short in the Cox Plate - Haradasun ran third in 2007 while Elvstroem could only finish eighth in 2004.

Highland Reel is now out do what his uncles couldn't, but with a Timeform Rating of 118+ he will have to go on improving if he is to do better than that pair - Haradasun was rated 126, Elvstroem 123.

That '+' indicates that he should prove better than 118 in time, and it's a symbol that takes us back to Adelaide, who arrived at the Valley with a plus on his rating that he would quickly put to good use.

Adelaide bucked a trend in last years Cox Plate by running ahead of his current rating. Prior to last year the 13 internationally-trained runners to contest the race this century had all run short of their absolute best at the Valley by a median of approximately 4.5 lengths, beating on average just 30% of their Cox Plate rivals.

Of course Adelaide beat 100% of his rivals last year, and returned a clear new peak Timeform rating of 128 in the process.

In the view of Timeform, Highland Reel's spring isn't as tightly coiled as Adelaide's was, with Adelaide having long been seen as a top horse in the making, but as a lightly raced three-year-old he should still be improving.

If he's to hand Ballydoyle a second Cox Plate Highland Reel will have to leap a bar set at this early stage by Criterion (rated 127), Arod (126) and Contributer (124) while Pornichet (123p) looms ominously.

Adelaide-like improvement would obviously see Highland Reel with a terrific winning chance but the more probable scenario is that we will see steady improvement, which should see him starting with a similar SP ($8) to Adelaide last season.

Before all of that Highland Reel has to pass the Arlington test that Adelaide raced 12 months back, but he should be well fancied to do so, and from there he becomes one of the spring's most interesting horses.