Scenery Spangles for Tony Cruz

The stocks of trainer Tony Cruz for next season's 4yo ranks have improved in the past two weeks and that continued with California Spangle remaining unbeaten on Sunday and the Golden Scenery confirming his promise at last Thursday's public holiday meeting.
The Golden Scenery looked promising of his debut second then again closed strongly for second to Big Fortune last week in a 1200m race he may well have won from a better draw.
He looks a horse who is going to train on for next season and so does the unbeaten griffin, California Spangles.
Once again, he found a track that was running quick so the class record time may have flattered him but his first attempt on 1200m was still eye catching, doing some work early then keeping on strongly as he had done down the straight 1000m.
He has a very likeable racing style, has improvement to come as he irons out a few issues in his racing manners and looks certain to run further than the 1200m trip as he matures.
That does it for both horses this season and they should improve for the summer break and return stronger.
All in all, the 4yo group heading into next season looks one of the more promising bunches of recent seasons, with many more to come that we have yet to see. A race like the Classic Mile usually needs a rating in the mid-90s on our scale to win and the contenders so far are queueing up in the 89+ range.
The current cut off rating for our list is 85 and we'll update it regularly.