Chapada breaks through for his second win

The Mike Moroney-trained Chapada has broken through at Flemington after an extended run of outs.

Dual Group One placegetter Chapada has snapped a lengthy absence from the winner’s circle to register just the second victory of his career at Flemington.

The Mike Moroney-trained Chapada strode to a one-length win over import Masaff in Saturday’s Grinders Coffee Carriage Paddock Plate (2520m) having been winless in his past 15 starts since breaking his maiden in country Victoria in the spring of 2018.

During that winless period he had been competitive at the elite level during his three-year-old season and arguably unlucky not to be a Group One winner.

Chapada was a luckless third in the Group One Victoria Derby and also ran third in the Group One Rosehill Guineas during the 2018-19 season.

His spring campaign last year included a placing at weight-for-age in the Group Two Zipping Classic (2400m).

“It’s just good to see the horse put them away and win another race,” Moroney’s stable representative Jack Turnbull said.

“Hopefully we can build off this.

“He hasn’t been far away. He’s just been a length or two behind in some good quality races.

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“We’ll just try to find these types of races for him just to get him back in the winner’s circle because he’s been so long out of it.”

Despite having only won twice, Turnbull noted Chapada was closing in on $500,000 in prize money.

Chapada’s breakthrough was Moroney’s 31st metropolitan winner in Victoria for the season while jockey Daniel Stackhouse posted his 14th metropolitan win of the season and 112th statewide in Victoria.

Stackhouse has ridden Chapada in his four starts this preparation and said it was a deserved win from the gelding.

“I spoke to Mike after he ran third here at Flemington last start (over 2000m) and we thought we’d target this race,” Stackhouse said.

“Mike said he’d put a bit of work into him and it was a great training performance.

“The race was going a bit strangely in certain places but he was so strong to the line.”

Favourite Massif ($3) could not reel in Chapada in the straight after being shuffled back coming to the home turn but that pair cleared out from the rest of the field with Sin To Win ($4.60) another 3-1/4 lengths away third.