Katana to conquer Christmas Stocking

By Isaac Murphy

Jim Gallaway has always had a soft spot for Queensland, where the Grafton trainer once headed a nursery of champions in his time living at Churchable, where he produced a raft of stars.

The trainer is still hard at it since moving south, and looks to have a good one in Katana - a four-time Albion Park winner who will look to build on his record in Thursday’s Christmas Stocking Final.

“I would have preferred him drawn inside for the Final, but it looks to have worked out fairly nicely from the seven with the speed dogs directly inside him and some of the slower beginners on the fence,” Gallaway said.

“Werina Express in the six is probably the quickest out and wants the fence and should give us plenty of room to follow him across and get in front of dogs like Pump It and Coast Guard in one and two who’ll be strong home.

“It could work out similarly to his heat, if he’s able to sit outside the leader hopefully he can find a couple of lengths having his second 500 for a couple of months.”

A tearaway sprinter at the start of his career, Katana is learning on his feet over the longer trips.

“He’s found a bit of race sense, when he was highballing out in front he could afford to run off and do a few things wrong,” Gallaway said.

“Now that he’s not a clear frontrunner every start, he’s learnt how to manoeuvre in a field; in his heat he was sitting outside the leader and hooked back to the fence on the home turn which I haven’t seen him do before.

“After 25 starts, those are the little signs you start looking for, he’s always had the will to win and now he’s starting to think on his feet too.” 

Gallaway had big plans for the two-year-old in 2020 but was forced to make a rushed decision when the borders closed which looks to have slightly affected Katana’s strengths.

“COVID dealt us a bit of a cruel blow earlier in the year, he was absolutely jumping out of his skin at Maitland and Grafton over the sprint and leading for fun; we had a timetable to get him to the 500 but had to send him up there a bit early,” he said.

“He still came out and won his first three races over the 500 in lower grades at Albion Park, but as time dragged on he probably had a few too many runs over the trip and lost a bit of his early dash before he came back home.

“You look at the positives though and what that racing has done for him is really toughen him up, just about all his wins come from that explosive early speed, it was good to see him run over the top of a dog last week.”

Gallaway always has his finger on the pulse and says he has a better read on what makes the dog tick these days.

“We’ve learnt you’ve just got to nurse him between his runs, he’s out of Barcia Bale and Splash of Magic which is a sprinting line; he’ll run 500, but you’ve got to give him a break,” he said.

“Early days he didn’t look like he’d get the trip and all of a sudden he put those few races together running around 29.9, he’s always going to be competitive with those times but has probably found his ceiling as a Fifth Grade dog on a Thursday night.

“There’s certainly no harm in that, the intention was to always get him up to Albion; he finds himself in a final for some nice money on Thursday and he’ll probably come back home before we venture up again in the new year.”

Torrential weather hasn’t made for an easy preparation for the dog, but Gallaway is hoping fresh is best.

“We’ve had a lot of rain down here (Grafton) and normally I’d give him a couple of light 250-metre runs up my straight track at home, but it’s been flooded out this week,” he said.

“I’ll find somewhere to give him a light hitout before Thursday night; he may be a bit underdone, but as I said he races well fresh so maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.

“He’s a young dog with a good head on his shoulders; he travels well, kennels well, but we’ll just see if he’s up to it come Thursday.”