Puissance De Lune Headed For Light Autumn

Sunday, 11 November 2012 05:00

A prospect as tantalising as any in Australian racing has emerged for the Melbourne autumn with boom stayer Puissance De Lune and world champion sprinter Black Caviar both scheduled to appear at Flemington.

Puissance De LunePuissance De Lune, arguably the most outstanding winner of the spring and nominal favourite for the 2013 Melbourne Cup, is likely to reappear in the Group Two Blamey Stakes in March only weeks after Black Caviar is due to run in the race renamed in her honour, the Black Caviar Lightning Stakes.

The provisional plan has been pencilled in following Puissance De Lune's stunning victory in the Queen Elizabeth Stakes at Flemington on Saturday, a performance that has resulted in him being priced at $8 for the next Melbourne Cup.

As ridiculous as the Cup odds are a year in advance, no other horse at this stage can be regarded in the same category as the import who has added another layer to the French racing legend that has arisen around Australia's greatest race.

Connections have pencilled in the Blamey, a 1600m weight-for-age contest run at Flemington on Australian Cup day, as one of a maximum of two runs for Puissance De Lune in an autumn preparation which would mirror that of Melbourne Cup winner Green Moon whose only autumn run was in the same race.

While the country's premier sprint, the Newmarket Handicap, is run on the same day, Black Caviar is most likely to run at weight-for-age in the Lightning a month earlier.

Trainer Darren Weir was still coming to terms with what he had in his stable the day after the horse raced his way into the imagination of the racing public.

"When he came into work the long term goal, if he was good enough, was the Bendigo Cup," Weir said.

"We won that and now we've won again.

"You just have to hope that he's in the same order this time next year."

While Weir says he had little idea of what Puissance De Lune had to offer until a couple of weeks ago, he presumably had a higher opinion of him than his previous trainer Philipe de Watrigant whose owners parted with him for a bargain 100,000 ($A123,426).

Photo: Quentin Lang