Golden Ticket match race previews

Far more than $70,000 total prize money is up for grabs this Thursday night as the eight qualifiers from the last week’s Golden Ticket heats battle it out for not only the purse, but perhaps most importantly a Golden Ticket into the Group 1 Gold Bullion Final for the fastest match race winner of the night.

It’s a giant advantage for the Ticket winner who will be able to bypass the heats with a guaranteed place in the Final, while their rivals duke it out in the following Thursday’s Gold Bullion heats for a chance to line up in the Group 1 feature.

The Golden Ticket Finals will be conducted as two-dog match races, pairing dogs together who ran the most similar times last week, making for some cracking contests.

The four match races will start with the dogs with the slowest two times and move through to the fastest dogs who will get last crack at the top time, but don’t rule out the early races with some likely types marked to be big improvers on the clock in the head-to-head format, so let’s take a look at the match ups.

Click here to see the TAB fixed odds for the Group 3 Golden Ticket. 

Match Race One – 9:01PM

#8 Yahiro Bale (VIC) – 30.17 vs #7 Throttle (WA) – 30.09

The first event features Victorian chaser Yahiro Bale for trainer Daniel Gibbons against a fellow up-and-comer in Throttle, the Sandgroper making the trip all the way from Western Australia to show off his talents.

Although they were the slowest to progress last week with times of 30.17 and 30.09 respectively, they should both thrive with another run at the track and appreciate the wide-open expanses with just two dogs running around Albion Park.

Gibbons charge already boasts a Group 3 South Australian Oaks to her name and won the Whiskey Riot feature on Phoenix night and perhaps most crucially boasts a victory in Best 8 company, where she took down a number of her competitors here at Albion Park a couple of week's ago.

She’ll have her work cut out against Throttle, a two-time Group Finalist himself, despite finding plenty of bother in the run last week, showed encouraging signs as he hit the line full of running first up since October.

The speed map seems to favour Throttle here who will jump from box one and likely hold the lead for much of this contest, but don’t count Yahiro out.

While she’s traditionally not as fast away, as many of her competitors have found out she can rattle off some slick late sectionals and will be charging on the post in an effort to be the clubhouse leader.

Click here to see the TAB fixed odds for Match Race One. 

Match Race Two – 9:14PM

#6 Hold Me Up (NSW) – 30.05 vs #5 Jay is Jay (QLD) – 30.01

Race two highlights the first Queenslander to get his chance on Thursday night, a dog who’s fast becoming known as one of the state’s premier talents in Selena Zammit’s Group 2 Queensland Derby winner Jay is Jay, who is considered more than a smoky for the series after just 14 starts.

The dogs recent form has been immaculate highlighted by his Derby win where he overcame box eight, but equally impressive have been his performances in open company at a tender age, finishing second in the Queensland Flame and showing plenty of guts to get over from box seven in last week’s heats to book his spot here.

Perhaps of most note to punters is his personal best around the track, a sizzling 29.59 seconds which puts him right in the same bracket as fastest qualifier Respectability, and in a two out match race from box one he’ll be looking to sizzle early to hold out his vastly experienced opponent.

It’s a State of Origin clash in this race with New South Welshman Joe Comito bringing well performed chaser Hold Me Up to town.

With 55 starts under his belt, she certainly has the experience edge and is also coming off a Group 3 Christmas Gift Final win at Wentworth Park before he ventured north, and notably earlier in 2022 was a Million Dollar Chase Finalist.

He was gutsy first-up at Albion Park last week as De Ferran and Hello Mike set the pace he continued to track into the race, before pipping Queensland’s most in-form dog Hello Mike on the post for his spot in this week’s Final where he should show plenty of improvement.

The jump in this match up is all important, Jay is Jay can ping out of the one at his best and control the race but if he lets the veteran in the picture early, he’s not a dog who gets chased down often.

Click here to see the TAB fixed odds for Match Race Two.  

Match Race Three - 9:26PM

 #4 Shipwreck (QLD) – 29.91 vs #3 De Ferran (QLD) – 29.80

Arguably Queensland’s most established national talent in Ned Snow’s Shipwreck shapes up against Tony Zammit winning machine De Ferran, who bounced back to form sensationally in his heat.

Shipwreck’s rise to prominence started almost a year to the day are he scorched through the time-honoured Vince Curry Series to announce his talent and was soon joined by talented litter mates Oh Oh Range and Pocket Money as household names.

He rose through the ranks quickly, a brilliant winner in his Flying Amy heat last year before running a stunning fourth in a stacked Final, he would go on to represent Queensland in the State of Origin match race downing the hot favourite Zipping Kyrgios to seal the series for Queensland.

He’s since been well performed in Victoria against some of the country’s best dogs and doesn’t shy away from the biggest races on the calendar.

De Ferran’s rise has been much more deliberate under the watchful eye of master trainer Tony Zammit who’s guided the dog to 16 wins from just 24 starts around the Queensland circuit.

Despite his prolific record for one of the first times in his career he went around as a marked underdog in last week’s four dog heat but showed what he was made off surging away from the competition to post the third quickest qualifying time 29.80 seconds. 

He began like a rocket last week and if he wants to beat the ultra-strong Shipwreck, he’ll look to emulate the feat which will be made even more difficult from box three, he could find himself in front but for how long?

Click here to see the TAB fixed odds for Match Race Three. 

Match Race 4 – 9:39PM

#2 Springtime Jet (QLD) – 29.68 vs #1 Respectability (NSW) – 29.59

Unsurprisingly the two dogs who really turned heads last week are the two who posted the quickest times, Sharyn Jackson’s local Springtime Jet and the Northern Rivers-trained Respectability for Michael Patterson.

Through their performances both will earn last crack at beating whatever time stands in their way after the first two heats, and on what they showed last week deserve the tag as the dogs to beat.

Unlike a lot of his elite rivals in the Golden Ticket Final Springtime Jet was not an overnight success, he flashed plenty of talent early but it took stints over the short course to build his confidence into the front running freak he is today.

The dog is the definition of a track specialist having never been away from Albion Park in his 40 career starts, and the more he turns up the better he gets, last week's 29.68 second mark equalling his personal best.

No doubt his most enviable quality is his box manners consistently posting 5.40 second splits early which should see him lead for fun from the red in this match up and if he’s running time he’ll take some catching with his big motor.

If there’s a dog with the fire-power from the outside draw it’s Patterson’s Respectability, who set Albion Park alight and was anointed as the next big thing after running 29.50 seconds in June last year.

It’s been a slightly rocky path for the dog since then but Patterson’s years of experience look to have him back on top at the right time, leaving them standing as he clocked 29.59 seconds last week.

As touched on he will have to come around Springtime Jet at some point to win this race and post a time, but a quick look at his splits around Albion Park at his best show this dog in the elite of the elite, which should set up a thrilling finale.

Click here to see the TAB fixed odds for Match Race Four.