Handicapper to have final Villiers say

The handicapper will determine the path trainer Desleigh Forster takes with Cylinder Beach with the options the Villiers Stakes in Sydney or the Brisbane Handicap at home.

Both races are scheduled for December 17.

Cylinder Beach made a dynamic return to racing when he easily beat a quality field in the Listed Recognition Stakes at Eagle Farm on Saturday.

The gelding carried the minimum 54kg but is likely to get a heft in the handicap ratings from his current 84.

“My other horse Too Good To Refuse was also an 84 rater when he won the Listed Keith Noud and he went up 10 points,” Forster said.

“But that doesn’t necessarily mean Cylinder Beach will get the same because they work it out on how much a race was scaled up.”

Forster said if Cylinder Beach went up too much in the ratings, meaning a sharp rise in weights, he would head to the Villiers.

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She said it was a fine line as Cylinder Beach needed to get his rating high enough to get into the better races but she did not want him to be crippled by weight rises in Brisbane.

Rudy, who won the Villiers in 2014, is likely to run in the race again this year.

The gelding was a solid fourth in the Recognition Stakes in which he had to carry 59.5kg.

Owner/breeder Tom Clarke, who races the Helen Page-trained Rudy with his brothers Don and David, said the gelding was paying the price for being so honest.

“Helen is keen to go to Sydney for the Villiers. Rudy was caught deep in the Recognition and will get weight relief in Sydney,” Clarke said.

The Villiers or Brisbane Handicap are also the options for Hopfgarten who was second in the Recognition with top weight of 60kg.

“Weight will stop a train and it would be nice to get some of it off Hopfgarten’s back,” trainer Robert Heathcote said.