Australia: Munitions set for best in Goldmarket Stakes at Gold Coast

Munitions was a $500,000 yearling purchase by Godolphin Racing at Keeneland in 2017, a hearty investment that never paid off.

Munitions was a Group 3 winner in France in 2019, and was sent to Australia in 2020. Munitions lost 10 races in Australia until he was purchased in an online auction for approximately $22,000 earlier this year by current trainer Richard Litt.

For Litt, Munitions was a good second by a nose in his debut for the stable in a handicap at six furlongs at Rosehill Gardens Racecourse in Sydney on Aug. 13. The narrow loss was a prep for the $103,600 Goldmarket Stakes at six furlongs at Gold Coast Racecourse south of Brisbane on Thursday evening across American time zones.

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The Goldmarket Stakes is the eighth race on a nine-race program that begins at 9:41 p.m. Eastern or 6:41 p.m. Pacific.

As of Wednesday, Munitions was 9-2 in early betting in a field of 12 led by Garibaldi at 5-2.

Munitions will be ridden for the first time by Samantha Collett, who is expected to have the 6-year-old Kentucky-bred in a tracking position from post 8, the same style of racing as Garibaldi and other contenders Ef Troop and Fender.

Munitions does have a slight advantage over those rivals in that he carries minimum weight of 119 pounds, while Garibaldi has an assignment of 123 pounds.

Redouble, a 9-year-old gelding who has won 6 of 47 starts, is the 130-pound topweight on the basis of two stakes wins in 2019. Redouble is winless in his last 18 starts and has had only four races since the beginning of 2021. But official handicap ratings that determine weight assignments are notoriously slow to decrease, leaving Redouble with a difficult weight assignment.

Ef Troop looks to be a particular threat for Garibaldi and Munitions. Winless in three starts since February, Ef Troop was second by a half-length in a five-furlong handicap at Eagle Farm Racecourse on Aug. 13, his first race in five months.

Ef Troop is a three-time winner at six furlongs, but was last of 11 in the 2021 Goldmarket in his final start that year.