Good things come to those who wait and that’s certainly been the case with middle distance newcomer Our Fabio, which is chasing a fifth straight win in Saturday night’s lucrative Grade 5 600m final at The Meadows.
Trained by Wayne and Jane Hooke, Our Fabio has come into his own since celebrating his third birthday in July, winning six of his last eight starts.
The son of Cosmic Rumble and Sweet Spud had won just once in his previous 14 assignments before embarking on his current career best run of form that’s boosted his record to 15 from 53.
“He’s flying along at the moment,” Jane Hooke said.
“He took a long time to get there. He was a little bit injury prone, and he was very awkward, but he’s finally starting to come into his own.
“He comes out really good, but he just needs a little bit of room early and then he gets going.
“We stepped him up to 600m for that reason. He was getting knocked over in the 500s, so 600m is where he needs to be.”
Our Fabio was having only his second start over 600m in last Saturday’s heats, where he led odds-on favourite Let’s Win Coin, comfortably, before holding the strong-finishing Lunar Star at bay in 34.71sec.
The other two heat winners were Soda Success (34.59sec) and Foxy Bourbski (34.73sec).
Our Fabio (Box 7) is rated a $4.60 chance to continue his rich vein of form in Saturday’s $12,000 to-the-winner final – Race 6 at 8.26pm.
“He’s very well drawn,” Jane said.
“He had the fastest first split of the night last Saturday (8.79sec) and there’s not a lot of speed drawn around him.
“If he comes out like last week, he should be okay. He’s not hit and miss but he can miss it sometimes.
“He only just got over the line in the heat, but I think he’ll improve on that, and he wants to win. He has a great will to win.
“We took him to Ballarat for a heat and final over 545m and he improved about five lengths in the final. He does improve the second time and last week was only his second run over 600m. He pulled up a bit sore after his first 600m, in August.
“He’s been on the lead all week. We’ve kept him fresh, so hopefully he can do it again.
“It’s a nice little purse and the owners are really excited, so it would be great to win the race for them.”
WATCH: “A good tough win”. OUR FABIO (B4) led all-the-way over 525m at The Meadows on September 14, holding CALL ME BUSTER (B5) at bay in 30.05sec.
Jane explained it was a combination of good fortune and Wayne taking an early shine to Our Fabio that saw him find his way to the Huntly mentors.
“We got him by pure fluke,” she said.
“We do a lot of breakers for his owners, Craig and Sonia Davis, and Craig asked Wayne to let him know if he liked any and we could train them.
“Wayne loved Our Fabio, so that’s how we got him. He’s a lovely dog, a very quiet dog and I think he’s suited to a small kennel.
“They’re spoiled rotten at our place. You look after them and they’ll look after you!”
