Racing: Filly's stay may be fleeting

Terry Chmiel.
Terry Chmiel.
Terry Chmiel would love to hold on to Whitershadeofpale but when the buyers come knocking, it is hard to turn them away.

The Changeover filly has been the subject of interest from agents and trainers based on her two trial wins in the last two months, and makes her debut at Timaru tomorrow.

New South Wales trainer-driver Luke McCarthy was originally going to drive the 3yr-old but is unable to make it and will trial Whitershadeofpale next week.

Chmiel takes the reins tomorrow.

The filly placed in a qualifying trial in April before Chmiel set her aside.

''She's quite a big filly and when she qualified at 2, she was crook so we turned her back out.'' he said.

The half-sister to River Black (9 wins) certainly did come back as an improved pacer, thrashing her 2yr-old rivals by 10 lengths over a mile at the Ashburton trials last month before winning a 2400m trial on August 5 by six lengths.

''She was a wee bit crook that day, too [which] we found out afterwards. But she just went straight by them and switched off a wee bit.

"They went 3.03 from the stand and they don't go much quicker, do they?

''She's quite a nice horse. She's still got to do it on race day but from what she's done around home and at the trials, she's a wee bit better than average.''

Stablemate Sicilian Secret is drawn inside Whitershadeofpale, but Chmiel expects the 4yr-old to be running for a place.

''She's gone well at Timaru every time she's lined up there, but she's a sit-sprint horse.''

Chmiel is in the envious position of having another classy horse lining up at Timaru.

Parramatta did the job for punters at Rangiora on August 17, and Chmiel is confident he can win again, with one reservation - tomorrow's 2600m mobile pace is a junior drivers' race.

''As long as things go the right way, he has a lot of speed, and he'll be hard to beat.''

Chmiel has the $40,000 Show Day Futurity at Addington in November as the main target for the McArdle entire, and the 4yr-old will remain ''intact'' until then.

''I do want to geld him - he does like the girls a bit now - but I don't want to do it before Cup Week in case anything goes wrong.''

The Fiery Ginga is a notable runner on tomorrow's card.

The 8yr-old has returned to the races after he fractured a sesamoid in March, which threatened to end his career.

However, he has recovered more quickly than expected and will start off 50m in the c2 and faster 2600m trot tomorrow.

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