The Trent Busuttin & Natalie Young-trained Mirage Dancer produced an enormous late effort to nudge out the favourite Mugatoo in the 2020 The Metropolitan results in Sydney ahead of a potential Spring Cups bid in Melbourne this prep.

Mirage Dancer is off to the 2020 Caulfield Cup after winning Sydney’s Group 1 The Metropolitan. Photo: Steve Hart.

A nicely-bred son of Frankel, seven-year-old Mirage Dancer went around at double-figures in this year’s Group 1 $750,000 The Metropolitan (2400m) on Epsom Day having run fourth at The Valley last start in the Group 3 JRA Cup (2040m).

Relishing the step-up to a mile and a half and a drop back from 60.5kg that run in Melbourne to 55.5kg in the Sydney showdown, Mirage Dancer ($10) was too good late for Kris Lees’ Newcastle Cup winner Mugatoo ($3F) beating him to the line by a half-head.

“It was amazing. The last time we backed him up was in the Tancred and the Chairman’s and he ran third, so we knew that he could do it,” co-trainer Young said trackside from Melbourne.

“At The Valley in the JRA Cup he just couldn’t quite corner, and he hit the line really nicely so we just thought that’s a perfect race and he gets in with 55.5 kilos.

“He’s been running consistent races and he’s been carrying that big weight.

“We thought ‘Group 1, Sydney, he goes on that leg’ and it’s $700,000 so we thought ‘why not’.”

The Metropolitan field was led around by the Hawkes Racing-trained light-weight Angel Of Truth ($19) carrying 52.5kg in the form of jockey Tommy Berry.

From the sustained run up-front, Angel Of Truth did well in a busy finish to hold for third and round out The Metropolitan trifecta at big odds.

There was an interesting move from jockey Glen Boss with 1000m to go as he whipped right around the field from last aboard Girl Tuesday to set outside of Angel Of Truth.

At the 600m, a number of the horses started with their runs, including Hush Writer who went up to the leaders after sitting up on the pace throughout.

With 300m to go, the well-backed favourite Mugatoo started to wind up on the outside, while Mirage Dancer was flashing home down the centre of the track.

Mugatoo got his head in front and looked the winner, but Mirage Dancer fought back to deny the favourite and hand Nash Rawiller his 62^nd career Group 1.

“He travelled like the winner the whole race. Gee he travelled nicely,” Rawiller said post-win.

“I had a lot of horse at the home turn and I just sort of got on the right horses back in Tim Clark and Hush Writer and he just took me as far as I needed to go to get out and he did the rest.

“He is a very good horse.”

It was the second The Metropolitan winning ride for Rawiller who, 10 years earlier, guided the Waterhouse-trained Herculian Prince (2010) to victory and he was full of post-win credit for Mirage Dancer.

“We probably haven’t seen the best of him since Caulfield Cup Day,” he said.

“On that, he has got to go around in the Melbourne Cup and be a genuine chance.

“You get on these type of horses and you don’t really know how they are going.

“Obviously, Trent told me that he was spot on but until you get on and canter to the gates you don’t know what you are going to feel but when I got to the 600m on the way to the gates I thought ‘wow I’m on a nice horse here’.

“He’s different class.”

Mirage Dancer has firmed in from $51 to $26 in the all-in markets at Ladbrokes.com.au on the $5 million Caulfield Cup (2400m) run on October 17.

“Nash just gave him a peach of a ride and he had a nice draw for a change. It’s amazing,” Young added.

“We thought the Turnbull would have been a bit stronger and we just thought that we wanted to chase that Group 1.

“He’s a Frankel stallion and he’s now a Group 1 winner in Australia.

“We were just mindful of that, trying to get a Group 1 on the way through to the Caulfield Cup.”

As for the $8 million Lexus Melbourne Cup (3200m) over the two miles at Flemington on November 3, the horse is at $51 with full markets available here.

2020 The Metropolitan Results

Colour	Finish	No.	Horse	Trainer	Jockey	Margin	Bar.	Weight	Penalty	Starting Price
	1	3	MIRAGE DANCER (GB)	Trent Busuttin & Natalie Young	Nash Rawiller		3	55.5kg		$10
	2	2	MUGATOO (IRE)	Kris Lees	Kerrin McEvoy	0.2L	7	57kg	1.0kg	$3F
	3	13	ANGEL OF TRUTH	Michael, Wayne & John Hawkes	Tommy Berry	0.4L	10	51.5kg (cd 52.5kg)		$19
	4	9	HUSH WRITER (JPN)	Gai Waterhouse & Adrian Bott	Tim Clark	1.9L	2	53kg		$5.50
	5	15	PATHS OF GLORY (GB)	Richard & Michael Freedman	Ms Kathy O’Hara	4L	14	50.5kg		$18
	6	18	ZEBROWSKI (NZ)	Michael, Wayne & John Hawkes	James Innes Jnr	4L	4	50kg		$7
	7	16	GIRL TUESDAY	Clarry Conners	Glen Boss	4.2L	18	50kg (cd 52kg)		$31
	8	8	BRIMHAM ROCKS (GB)	Chris Waller	Brenton Avdulla	4.3L	13	53.5kg		$14
	9	1	MUSTAJEER (GB)	Kris Lees	Hugh Bowman	4.4L	5	58kg		$61
	10	12	RONDINELLA (NZ)	John O’Shea	Ms Rachel King	4.8L	12	51.5kg		$21
	11	11	CARIF	Peter & Paul Snowden	Robbie Dolan	6L	9	52.5kg		$31
	12	4	WU GOK	Chris Waller	Sam Clipperton	7.1L	11	55kg		$51
	13	6	ETAH JAMES (NZ)	Ciaron Maher & David Eustace	Regan Bayliss	8.7L	6	53.5kg		$51
	14	14	AZURO (FR)	Ciaron Maher & David Eustace	Ms Louise Day (a)	9L	17	51.5kg		$301
	15	21e	SIR CHARLES ROAD	Lance O’Sullivan & Andrew Scott	Brock Ryan (a)	10.3L	8	51kg		$101
	16	19e	NORWAY (IRE)	Chris Waller	Ms Alysha Collett	10.9L	16	50.5kg		$101
	17	17	MISS SENTIMENTAL (NZ)	Chris Waller	Ms Jess Taylor	11.1L	15	50kg		$301
	18	20e	ATTENTION RUN (GER)	Kris Lees	Andrew Gibbons	13.6L	1	50kg		$31
		22e	GREY LION (IRE)	Matthew Smith			0
		7	SHARED AMBITION (IRE)	Chris Waller	James McDonald		0
		5	RAHEEN HOUSE (IRE)	Kris Lees	Jason Collett		0
		10	LORD BELVEDERE (GB)	Ciaron Maher & David Eustace	Ms Kathy O’Hara		0

Table Credit: Racing Australia.