When it comes to country cups, often it pays to trust the local hopes.
So when the aptly named Total Faith steps out in Heat 3 of the Ladbrokes Bidgee Cup on Friday night, trainer Alan Clare reckons you can channel your inner George Michael and have faith, faith, faith.
“He’s nice, good natured dog who does everything right, and importantly, he’s got really good form around Wagga Wagga. Up until the regional final of the Million Dollar Chase at the track, he had won six in a row there over the 525m,” Clare said.
“Box 3 is perfect for him and he’s gone 5.15 to the first mark before, if he runs that, he’ll lead and if he leads, I don’t think they’ll catch him because he goes pretty quick there.”
The Nangus local quietly confident his son of Fernando Bale x Star Faith can bounce back into the winner’s circle after a couple of super efforts at Wentworth Park.
“We took him to town for the semifinals of the MDC and he struck a really hot one in Inconspicuous who came out and ran 29.3. Total Faith was a bit unlucky that day, he missed the start a bit and checked off Krystal Shinners dog going into the second turn and that cost him three of four lengths,” Clare added.
“He managed to hold off some group performers in behind him though, so I was really happy with the run. We took him back a few weeks ago and he seemed to stumble out of the boxes but still ran second to a pretty handy one in Screaming Violet.”
Clare, a 40-year veteran in the chasing caper, claiming Total Faith is “the second-best dog” he’s ever had ahead of the Group 3 preliminaries.
“The best I trained was Blue Warning back in 1994. I’ve only had a few dogs here and there since but I train all the Faith dogs for Arthur and George Poulos now, they’re brothers from Melbourne,” he added.
“I reared, broke in and pre-trained this whole litter and Total Faith is the best of them by a long way. But I’ down here on 12 acres now. I’ve got 20 kennels, five racings yards, a 300m straight track, a 100m x 30m gallop paddock and we’re about an hour from Wagga Wagga.”
“Now that I’ve wrapped the dog he’ll probably go under but he’s a good chaser. Slick Rambo in Box 2 goes pretty good. [Anthony] Azzopardi is on fire and he trialled Gold Scotch 24.70 or 24.80 post to post the other day so we’ll have to run well to win.”
Five heats of the Group 3 Ladbrokes Bidgee Cup will be contested on Friday, November 8 with the $25,000-to-the-winner final slated for November 15. The top two from each heat and the next three fastest will qualify for the decider.
