Royes dreaming of more Townsville success

By Glenn Davis

Trainer Steven Royes has been striking at better than 20 per cent over the last 12 months and is hopeful the trend continues at Townsville on Tuesday.

Royes is looking to his promising filly Catalina Dreaming returning to winning form in the QTIS Three-Years-Old Handicap while he will be doubled handed with Dollson and Dusky Damsel in the Benchmark 70 Handicap.

Both races will be run over 1200 metres.

Royes, a former mines supervisor in Mount Isa and Cloncurry, made a brave decision two years ago to turn his back on his well-paid mining job and only started training full-time a few months ago.

“I had six boxes in Mount Isa while I was working in the mines there before I decided to move to Townsville,” Royes said.

“I’ve only been training full-time now for a couple of months after being a fly-in fly-out mine supervisor at Cloncurry and Mount Isa.”

The 58-year-old now has a stable of 15 at Wulguru which backs on to Townsville’s Cluden Park.

Royes has had 104 starters in the past 12 months for 21 wins for a strike-rate of 20.2 per cent while his season statistics stands at 16.7 per cent with 13 wins and 24 placings from 78 starters.

Catalina Dreaming was formerly trained by Wendy Kelly in Victoria before being bought by prominent North Queensland owner Tom Hedley, who is Royes’ major owner.

Catalina Dreaming - a Jason Taylor mount - had one start in Victoria finishing fifth in a 1200 metre maiden on the Ballarat synthetic track in August last year before being moved on.

In her first start for Royes, she won a maiden over 1000 metres at Townsville in late February before finishing second at her past two starts, including a fast finishing second to Nazorian over 950 metres at Cairns on April 22.

“She’s had three starts for me and should have won them all,” Royes said.

“She’s a fizzy little filly and she looked like winning at one stage last start.

“Unfortunately, one bucked in front of her at the start and she was a bit slow away.”

Royes is undecided about a winter campaign in North Queensland for Catalina Dreaming.

“I’ll play it by ear at this stage but generally horses will let you know how good they are,” he said.

The eight-year-old Dollson has won two of his past three starts and is coming off a last start second at a non-TAB meeting at Maxwelton while Dusky Damsel won at Townsville on March 5 prior to a last start third in a 1000 metre Benchmark race at Cluden Park on April 13.