There was a time when Sterling Alexiou feared Banana Queen would never regain the confidence she lost on Sydney’s wet autumn tracks, but happily for the trainer the mare has resurrected her form.
After making a promising start to her career, Banana Queen was beaten a total of more than 27 lengths in three unplaced starts on heavy tracks during the carnival.
She then had another setback when she bumped her joint on the barriers first-up at Newcastle in October but she hasn’t looked back since, her victory in Saturday’s Fujitsu General Handicap (1600m) her third in succession.
“She was plagued by those wet tracks like a lot of horses,” Alexiou said.
“It is pleasing to get her back to where she was because we thought we’d lost her for a while.
“Racing on those heavy tracks, she just seemed to lose a lot of confidence on them and it knocked her around a bit.”
Alexiou said he and co-trainer Gerald Ryan hadn’t looked beyond Saturday’s race but were keen to eventually get Banana Queen back to black-type grade.
Ridden by Brenton Avdulla, the $4.60 betfair favourite stalked the speed before bounding clear to score by 1-3/4 lengths over Ella Te Ama ($9) with race leader Nothinsweetaboutme ($13) holding on for third.
Quote of the day: “We wanted to make a statement and make sure he knows what racing is all about and he delivered in spades.”- co-trainer Peter Snowden after well-bred juvenile Don Corleone made a winning debut.