Sunshine Delight nearing his best ahead of Gold Cup Final

By Jordan Gerrans

Beachmere trainer Paul Mcilveen believes his kennel star Sunshine Delight is getting back to his peak form ahead of the Ipswich Gold Cup Final of 2022.

The black dog was one of six heat winners on Thursday evening to progress through to next weeks Group 2 decider, claiming the last heat of the evening in 30.77 seconds to book his position. 

The performance was a return to Sunshine Delight’s best, the experienced trainer thinks.

Mcilveen and the 18-time career winner made the trip south to Sydney in the middle of September and the trainer believes the journey took it out of his chaser.

In his five starts since, he has been around the mark on each occasion, running in the placings twice, but was unable to add to his win tally.

The almost two length victory around the Ipswich circuit on Thursday evening was a sign that the top dog was back to his best, the trainer says.

“The dog has been a little bit off since I took him down to the semi-final of the Million Dollar Chase earlier this year,” Mcilveen said.

“The travel down there might have knocked him around as we went down the day of races and we came home straight after.

“I think it just flattened him; I did not realise at first how much it did.

“It has taken him quite a few weeks to get him back.”

The Claude Dacey-trained Nando Dreamer was the quickest qualifier for Thursday’s $150,000 Final, doing so in 30.36 seconds.

After finishing fifth in his Million Dollar Chase semi-final at Wentworth Park in September, Mcilveen focussed his attention on taking Sunshine Delight for more walks on the beach to freshen him up.

He rarely trials the three-year-old – just walking on the sand – and had noticed he was much happier in recent days leading towards the Gold Cup heats.

Sunshine Delight was able to find the fence nearing the winning post on the first occasion on Thursday night and finished better than Running Express and He’s So Cool in the concluding stages.

“He seemed more attuned to his environment on the beach and I thought he would run a lot better this week,” Mcilveen said.

“He has picked up in the last week and he seemed a happy dog again.

“He does not want outside boxes but he jumped well and positioned up lovely.

“He found the line good.”

Like he was in the heats, Sunshine Delight again starts from outside in the decider, this time jumping with the black rug on.

Mcilveen said he would have preferred an inside draw.

Like Mcilveen, veteran trainer Dacey also was not over the moon following the box draw.

Nando Dreamer won from an inside draw in the fourth heat of the night and will be in the middle of the pack in box five in the Final.

“It was awful as she likes the inside,” the veteran dog man said when asked about her starting position.

“She does not like the outside at all.”

The rest of the heats on Thursday evening were won by: the Kevin Murnane-trained He’s All Purpose, Hara’s Herbie for Jemma Daley, Jedda Cutlack’s Sunburst and Ned Snow kicked off what could be a big few days for his kennel with Come On Aussie winning a qualifier.