Numerian leads throughout in Q22

By Craig Brennan

Annabel Neasham has collected another big prize with a European import, taking out the Group 2 Q22 at Eagle Farm.

Numerian led throughout to claim the 2200m contest on Saturday following his stablemate Zaaki who won the race last year for Annabel Neasham.

Taken to the front by Tommy Berry, Numerian ($21) scored by length from Kolding ($18) with Yonkers ($21) running on for third, a further three-quarters-of-a-length away.

Numerian was having his first start in five weeks, having not raced since taking out the Listed Gosford Cup early last month.

Neashem said she had considered starting Numerian in the rescheduled Group 1 Doomben Cup (2100m) at Eagle Farm on May 28.

"We hadn't raced him sparingly at the start of the prep, but we decided to keep his legs fresh for this," Neasham said.

Now Neasham has some thinking to do with Numerian and will discuss options with the ownership group with the gelding.

"He's ran well every time this preparation and he's just kept on improving, and I think we can probably set our sights on something nice in the spring now," Neasham said.

"I'll obviously talk to the connections, and we'll work out where we go with him now, but I think after the performance he put in here today he deserves to be set for something nice now."

Berry said the plan was to try and dictate Saturday's race as there did not look a lot of speed.

"We were able to do that," Berry said.

"He got into a lovely rhythm for me and just at the 700 (metres) I picked it up a bit, and from the 600, I really put the foot to the floor and got him into his work.

"He was always going to be hard to run down, but he probably didn't get the credit he deserved going into the race."