Many of Ciaron Maher’s key spring players are nearing trial stage, but one of his Group 1 winners who might have a later start to spring than many is Socks Nation.
The daughter of Sioux Nation was given several weeks off following her blowout win in the $700,000 Queensland Oaks at Eagle Farm on June 8.
That 2200-metre event was the final run in a 12-start debut campaign, which prompted a deserved spell and Suman Hedge, who bought Socks Nation for $160,000 at the Inglis Premier Yearling Sale, said with the elongated Spring Carnival there was no need to rush her back.
“There’s some really good prizemoney to be won throughout spring and now that she’s already a Group 1 winner we don’t really have that pressure to try to build her CV,” Hedge said.
“From a practical point of view, maybe those secondary type of races later into the carnival, when some of the other horses have gone by the wayside, is when we might try to find something.”
The Queensland Oaks win was Socks Nation’s third career success at her first try at the highest level in what was her first start beyond 1800m.
Hedge was as surprised as anyone she was able to win the Oaks but said that will give the team confidence in any staying race Maher wants to contest with the Group 2 Zipping Classic a race she could be suited to if sights are set lower than the Caulfield Cup and Melbourne Cup.
“That’d be a very smart option and, if it was up to me and I had any influence over it, that would be a race I would look at,” Hedge said.
“Most of the top horses are set for the Cups and the European horses, most of them are gone, so it’s definitely an opportunistic play for good prizemoney and she is good at that track.”
The $750,000 Zipping Classic (2400m) will be run at Caulfield on November 30, while the $500,000 Ballarat Cup (2000m) seven days later is another potential option.
