If TAB betting is any guide middle-distance sensation Zipping Rambo will rebound from a shock last start defeat when he returns to The Meadows on Saturday night.
Beaten at $1.30 last weekend, Zipping Rambo, which is trained by Mark Delbridge at Balliang, will get every opportunity to bounce back in the fourth event (7.43pm) over 600m, where he’s been marked at $1.45 from box two against just five rivals.
Two starts back at Sandown Park, Zipping Rambo clocked a jaw-dropping 33.66sec, just .03 (half-length) outside former superstar Dyna Double One’s track record and the second-fastest time ever recorded over the 595m course.
“I thought he would possibly break ‘34’ but I didn’t think he would go that quick,” Delbridge said.
“He did run a good race at The Meadows a couple of starts earlier (34.16sec). He equalled the first split record and was only a length off the second split record that night.
“He was less than a length off Dyna Patty’s first split record at Sandown and he was pulling away at the end too. I’d expect him to run 650m but I’m not sure about the ‘700’.”
After that stunning Sandown performance the well-bred son of Group 1-winning sprinter Mister Twister and Zipping Maggie, back-to-back winner of the G3 Chairman’s Cup at Wentworth Park in 2014/15, started long odds-on favourite at The Meadows last Saturday.
However, after meeting with early interference he was never a winning prospect, finishing third to all-the-way 34.28sec winner Bounce Back.
“If he pings to the front he’s an absolute superstar but he’s a funny dog,” Delbridge said.
“When he’s behind he doesn’t want to go underneath dogs, he wants to go around them, and he showed that last week.
“He got out alright but then the ‘red’ (Mepunga Sparkle) pushed up underneath him and whacked him. That took the wind out of him and I think he clipped the heels of David Geall’s dog (Bounce Back) as well.
“Had that not happened he would have lobbed second and I think he would’ve given the winner a run for its money.
“Box 2 is alright for him. I don’t think boxes really matter – he ran 29.75sec off the ‘pink’ at The Meadows not long after we got him from NSW – he just needs to ping out and get a clear run.”
