David Pfieffer is confident the progressive Ice Kool can measure up in Saturday night’s $3 million Magic Millions Sunlight Plate (1100m) at the Gold Coast.
The three-year-old slot race was taken out by future Group 1 winner Private Harry in its inaugural running last year and will again feature a full field of 12, with Ice Kool drawing barrier nine at Tuesday’s draw.
An impressive 3½-length winner on debut at Warwick Farm on December 3, Ice Kool stepped straight into a Benchmark 72 for three- and four-year-olds and again showed his speed when scoring at Randwick on December 27.
Ice Kool will compete under prominent owner Max Whitby’s slot and Pfieffer believes the slightly shorter turnaround between runs will only help the gelding.
“He’s going to go into this race probably better prepared than last start,” Pfieffer said.
“Last start, he was three and a half weeks between runs. And so now, he’s going into it two weeks between runs, and it hopefully should suit him really well.
“He had a quiet week last week, had a gallop on Saturday with Jason (Collett) on board and had his final gallop Tuesday morning.
“He’ll get on a truck Thursday night and head to Queensland.”
With the Sunlight Plate always on the radar, Pfieffer said Ice Kool needed to take a significant step forward at his second start to justify heading north.
“He’d done a few little things wrong, and he still does a few little things wrong, but he’s getting better every trial, getting better every race start,” Pfieffer said.
“To get a slot, you’ve obviously got to prove yourself. Throwing him in a Saturday race was obviously a big step, but he stepped up to the plate.
“If he hadn’t got the job done, well, he doesn’t get a slot in this race. If he didn’t achieve that goal, well, we wouldn’t be talking now, would we?”
Despite leading in both starts so far, Pfieffer is hopeful the speed map plays in Ice Kool’s favour, noting Swordplay and North England drawn wider.
“He can be slow out, which he has been his last two starts,” Pfieffer noted.
“He’s not lightning out of the gates, like Swordplay is going to, it’ll launch out of the gates, so that might just create that hole in behind them.”
Markets are open with leading Australian betting sites for the Magic Millions Sunlight Plate, giving punters plenty of options ahead of the rich sprint.
Ice Kool is a $4.50 second elect for the Sunlight Plate behind the Kelly Schweida-trained Grafterburners ($2.80), who is unbeaten in three runs this preparation and has drawn barrier two.
The post Ice to stay Kool in Magic Millions Sunlight first appeared on Just Horse Racing.
