THE unheralded combination of seven-year-old gelding Jigsaw, his trainer Cindy Alderson and apprentice jockey Logan Bates continued on their winning streak with a victory in the G1 William Reid Stakes (1200m) at Caulfield.
The win made it six successive victories for the trio and their second Group 1 win as Jigsaw also won the Railway Stakes at Ellerslie.
As is his wont, Jigsaw dominated the race, and Bates was able to plot a path to the better lane, which was in the middle of the track in the straight.
Incredibly, Jigsaw ran the same time as he did for the 1200m at Caulfield as when he won the VOBIS Gold Dash a week before, which was 1:08.83 minutes.
It has been an amazing training effort from Alderson as Jigsaw has been an above-average sprinter since he started racing as a two-year-old, except a year ago, when she even tried him over a longer trip to find form.
Now Alderson has to work out what to do next with Jigsaw, with The Quokka in Perth a strong possibility.
It was Jigsaw’s 15th win from 39 starts and he defeated seven other Group 1 winners on Saturday.
Alderson was almost in disbelief after the victory, saying it’s getting more and more unbelievable.
“I keep thinking it’s going to stop sooner or later. He’s not giving me any indications it’s going to stop,” Alderson said.
“It’s amazing for a small stable like ours to have the opportunity to have a horse like this at this stage of my career.”
It was Bates’ first Group One in Australia and he said he will remember it forever.
“It means everything. It’s quite unbelievable. I thought about it during the week and this horse has just left me speechless today.
“Just to the fact of going back and looking at his whole preparation and just watching him grow. It’s so special.”
Jigsaw defeated Angel Capital by a long neck, who was again unlucky, with last year’s Golden Slipper winner Devil Night finishing third at $81.
Beaten Jockeys:
Mark Zahra (Jimmysstar, 7th): “Just never in the zone today. Barrier one, which is obviously not the barrier you want today, inside of them striving to get cover most of the race and then he was wanting to lay in the straight in the worst going, so I think you can forgive it.”
William Pike (Rey Magnerio, 6th): “I thought he went really well, we weren’t beaten too far. It was a bit of a slower-run race than I was expecting, so I thought he accounted for himself well.”
Jye McNeil (Angel Capital, 2nd): “It got a bit tight rounding the turn and he lost his running a little bit, but his last 400 was better than anything in the race, so he’s going really well.”
Ben Allen (Baraqiel, 5th): “Another honest run. Had the right run, the others were a bit better today.”
John Allen (Airman, 11th): “We had a nice resting run, just didn’t really finish off.”
Jamie Mott (Tropicus, 10th): “He stepped quite slow and from that inside draw we were dictated to by the runners outside us and he was just uncomfortable throughout, so he didn’t finish off.”
Michael Dee (Magic Time, 9th): “I don’t think her run was too bad; we weren’t beaten too far. She’ll improve a lot with the run.”
Thomas Stockdale (Charm Stone, 4th): “Good getaway I was able to control the tempo from where I was on the track. I was able to serve it up to the winner when I wanted to, felt like the winner at the top of the straight, but he just had race fitness on me. Great for Logan, he deserves it, the fella.”
Daniel Stackhouse (Benedetta, 8th): “She was OK. She hit a bit of a flat spot on the corner just racing in restricted tight room, Jimmy to my inside and Angel Capital to the outside, and just lost her momentum a little bit and then she closed off nicely late.”
Beau Mertens (Devil Night, 3rd): “Terrific run. He’s back in good form. I had a terrific run in transit, just took a little bit to get balanced once we straightened up, but I thought it was an ultra-good effort to be finishing off with Jigsaw.”
