When he runs in next Tuesday’s Melbourne Cup, the third favourite Mount Athos won’t have raced for 80 days.
And according to his trainer Luca Cumani, that’s just perfect.
“His form card makes it very clear that he races best when fresh,” Cumani said.
“He’s done best when raced sparingly, that’s how he likes it.”
Mount Athos is one of the few Cumani-trained horses to tackle the Melbourne Cup without having raced in Australia and will go into the Cup not having started since August 18 when he won the Group Three Geoffrey Freer Stakes (2600m) at Newbury.
That was his third win on end, the previous coming 35 days earlier after an eight-week break and the first win of the sequence, over 2800m, coming after a 32-week spell.
“That’s just him, I’m not changing what has worked well.”
Cumani hadn’t seen Mount Athos for three weeks before inspecting the horse at Werribee on Monday and admitted to be “very pleasantly surprised” when he did.
“Most times when I’ve arrived here they’ve had their troubles, not eating, not drinking, things like that,” he said.
“But both my horses are in great shape.”
Cumani’s second runner, My Quest For Peace, has also pleased the trainer since his Caulfield Cup fifth, and will have a final hit-out later this week.
Cumani said he hadn’t decided when Mount Athos would do his next strong work, with Friday or Saturday looking most likely.