Sydney trainer Lionel Cohen has opted to start Aeronautical in the Gilgai Stakes at Flemington on Saturday rather than the Premiere Stakes at Randwick.

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Both are races Group Two events run over 1200m but Cohen believes the Melbourne race, with its set weights and penalties, rather than weight-for-age event at Randwick, is better suited to his five-year-old.

Aeronautical will carry 55.5kg at Flemington, when he tries to turn the tables on Sessions who beat him by a nose in their last outing at Randwick.

In Sydney, he would have to carry 58.5kg under the weight-for-age scale.

“Certain horses are straightforward and become weight-for-age horses straightaway because they are that good, but others have to work their way through the handicapping ranks,” Cohen said.

“There’s an old saying: `keep your horses in the weakest company and yourself in the best’.

“I’m not saying Saturday’s race is a weak field but I probably have a better chance there on the way he is handicapped compared to Sydney – that’s the bottom line.”

Also in the Gilgai is Spirit Of Boom who finished third behind Aeronautical in the Group Two Shorts, which Sessions won, on September 21.

“There’s not much between those first three horses and if you ran the race again you would probably get a different result – and we are running the race again,” Cohen said.

“Whether it’s my turn, we’ll have to wait and see, but he is such an honest, game horse and he’s often been beaten the way things have landed at the line.”

Cohen said the Gilgai was part of the spring program that includes the Yellowglen Stakes (1200m) on Victoria Derby Day his main target.

“But at this stage, we just want to get something on the board,” he said.

He said Aeronautical had shown his liking for the Flemington straight with his third in the Group One Newmarket Handicap in March – the first time he had raced in Melbourne.