Voodoo Lad heads up Weir’s 2018 Aurie’s Star Handicap nominations

Veteran sprinter Voodoo Lad heads up trainer Darren Weir’s three nominations for the 2018 Group 3 $150,000 Aurie’s Star Handicap (1200m) at Flemington on Saturday.

Voodoo Lad, above, heads up trainer Darren Weir’s nominations for the 2018 Aurie’s Handicap at Flemington. Photo by Ultimate Racing Photos.

Last start Flemington winner Camdus and Man From Uncle join Voodoo Lad in the Aurie’s Star Handicap entries which have been extended until 10am on Tuesday August 7, 2018.

Voodoo Lad is the winner of eleven of his twenty-eight starts but is yet to win at Flemington but has been placed on three occasions down the straight with his best effort being a second to the Lindsay Park trained Redkirk Warrior in the Group 1 $1.25m Lexus Newmarket Handicap (1200m) during the 2017 Melbourne Autumn Carnival.

Also included in the ten original nominations is the Lindsay Park German import Poetic Dream.

Poetic Dream has raced once for Lindsay Park co-trainers David and Ben Hayes and Tom Dabernig for a fifth in the Group 3 $150,000 Autumn Handicap (1400m) at Flemington during the 2018 Melbourne Autumn Carnival but showed marked improvement when he won a recent Flemington jump out with the blinkers on.

Hayes gave Poetic Dream another jump out down the Flemington straight last Friday without the blinkers but said he would definitely wear them in the Aurie’s Star Handicap on the weekend.

“He’ll probably race beyond a sprint distance at a mile with no blinkers but in the lead-up to those races I’ll run him in blinkers,” David Hayes told AAP.

“He seems pretty fast in them.”

Hayes is happy to wait and see how Poetic Dream performs under race conditions before mapping out the rest of the 2018 Spring Carnival which could include some Group 1 assignments.

“I don’t want to talk about those races until he’s shown his form in Australia, but it’s very encouraging what we’re seeing,” Hayes said.

Nominations for 2018 Aurie’s Star Handicap

#	Last 10	Horse	Sex	Age	Trainer	Hcp Rating
1	6x11116x88	ABILITY	G	6	Henry Dwyer	101
2	15x11375x1	BRAVE SONG	G	4	Peter & Paul Snowden	83
3	86125×1751	CAMDUS (IRE)	G	7	Darren Weir	96
4	x0x1x1230x	HOME OF THE BRAVE (IRE)	G	7	James Cummings	107
5	83x477100x	I AM A STAR (NZ)	M	5	Shane Nichols	106
6	x115x80x46	MAN FROM UNCLE	G	5	Darren Weir	90
7	857×725771	OVERSTEP	M	5	Chris Waller	79
8	13173x5x	POETIC DREAM (IRE)	H	5	David & B Hayes & T Dabernig	98
9	x411x4614x	RICH CHARM	G	6	Udyta Clarke	104
10	7x145x0012	VOODOO LAD	G	7	Darren Weir	107