Cherish Me gets well-deserved spell

By Jonny Turner 

A tenacious Silk Road Final victory completed the first phase of Kentuckiana Lodge filly Cherish Me's career emphatically.

The Cran and Chrissie Dalgety trained three-year-old was put to the test at both ends of her Addington assignment and she rose to the challenge at the end of an epic home-straight battle with Seeking Clarity.

While she's bred to have plenty of speed and stamina, being from the champion mare Adore Me, there was another factor that was just as important in Cherish Me's victory.

"She burnt the candle at both ends and somewhere in the middle too," Cran said.

"She was there to be run down at the 200m, because she'd done that early work."

"To be challenged like she was by a very nice horse like the runner-up and then to fight so hard to win, we were very proud of her."

"She was all out but just kept squeezing out enough to win."

"You can't buy those qualities or pick them out of a sales book."

"It is exciting to think how she might rise to the challenges we have in mind for her in the future."

After winning four of five starts for owners Paul and Mary Kenny of Charles Joseph Ltd, Cherish Me has earned herself a spell.

That will give the Dalgety camp time to lock in a plan aimed at the spring's three-year-old fillies features.

"We will look to give her about a month off."

"She deserves it, she has come quite some way in a very short time."

"With a horse with her breeding, it can be easy to put the cart before the horse and expect she's going to go on and do all sorts of things."

"But it hasn't all been straightforward, she's thrown a few challenges at us and we have just tried to progress slowly."

"We are very fortunate that she has very supportive owners who know horses better than most."

"She did it nicely in her first few starts and we thought we were getting somewhere."

"But in these last two wins she's really stamped herself as a quality filly."

"She deserves a crack at some of the three-year-old fillies events later in the year."

"We will come up with a bit of a plan for that while she is out."

Cherish Me will join her stablemate in the Group 1 winner Roger That, who is also enjoying some mid-year downtime.

Kentuckiana Lodge open class star Republican Party is heading in the opposite direction, with time on a water-walker to set him up for his next campaign.

Despite starting off 40 metres, Friday night also saw a return to the winner's circle for Mo'unga.

The Regan Todd-trained pacer started well off his backmark and was positioned well in the running line by driver Robbie Close before again showing his explosive speed to win by over a length.

It was the seven-year-old's 13th win in 44 starts.