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Top Sydney trainer Peter Snowden hopes to add to the significant role he has played in recent Ramornie Handicap history at Grafton next week.

Snowden won back to back to editions of the Ramornie in 2010 and 2011 with Pinwheel and Jerezana when he was head of Sheikh Mohammed’s Darley stable at Warwick Farm.

He had another crack at winning the Ramornie for Darley in 2013 with Soledad but he could finish only sixth.

Snowden was back again last year when I’ve Got The Looks, representing the training partnership he has formed with his son Paul, started favourite but let the team down with a disappointing tenth.

The Snowdens are mounting another Grafton assault next week with last Saturday’s Rosehill winner El Sasso set to go for his first black type win in the $160,000 Crowe Horwath Ramornie (1200m).

The Snowdens are focused on the Ramornie as the next target for El Sasso after taking stock of his scope for improvement from his impressive first-up BM90 win over 1100m at Rosehill at his first start for 91 days.

Snowden said El Sasso would normally have had two trials leading into his first run after a spell but had been going so well in training that he resumed after only one trial.

“We had been so impressed with the way El Sasso had returned in his work that we felt we could keep him fresh with just the one trial and target the 1100m first up,” Snowden said.

It was the sixth win in 30 starts for El Sasso and Snowden believes it was a performance that more than justifies a trip to Grafton for the Ramornie, the richest country sprint race in NSW.

El Sasso, raced by a big ownership group after he was syndicated by Triple Crown Syndications, recorded his first three wins while under the care of Rosehill trainer Gerald Ryan.

He joined the Snowden team at Randwick last year and has since added another three wins and three placings from nine starts under their care.

Blake Shinn rode El Sasso last Saturday but the sprinter requires a new jockey in the Ramornie as Shinn is now serving a one month suspension.

The Snowdens also plan to send the talented three-year-old Hand From Above, a last start winner over 1600m at Warwick Farm to Grafton with El Sasso for a crack at the $50,000 Grafton Guineas (1600m) on Ramornie day.

• ENTRIES for the $160,000 Ramornie Handicap on July 13 and $160,000 Grafton Cup (2350m) on July 14 close at 11am on Thursday.