Hunter keeping options open with Belwazi

After recording a winning hat-trick, trainer Jerome Hunter would like to maintain the streak with Belwazi.

But whether Belwazi will do that at Caulfield on Saturday or at Moonee Valley the previous night, Hunter is unsure.

Belwazi has won four of her five starts to date including her debut at Cranbourne in April.

The four-year-old started her latest campaign with victory at Corowa in early November before going on to victory at Moe on November 21 and then graduating to city company with an easy Moonee Valley win over 955m on December 1.

The daughter of Bel Esprit is nominated for another 955m race on Friday night and two races over 1100m at Caulfield on Saturday.

Hunter favours the benchmark 84 grade race for fillies and mares over an open handicap of the two options on Saturday.

“I’ll be watching the acceptances as they come in and I will make a decision on what is the weakest race,” Hunter said.

“I think she’ll be competitive in those races I’m thinking about from what I’ve seen in the nominations.

“Every race she wins, it’s going to get harder and harder for her, so we’ll see how far we can get, but I think there’s plenty of more wins in her.”

Hunter always held confidence in Belwazi right from the early work he did with her, but was reluctant to push too far too early.

And the Mornington-based horseman was happy to bypass the spring carnival and wait for easier summer options.

“She’s always shown that she’s got something so that’s why we’ve looked after her until she was fully developed,” Hunter said.

“She’s not the biggest of horses but we made sure we gave her a bit of time and it’s paying off now.

“We dodged the spring carnival time with her because you’re up against Australia’s best horses.

“This time of year is good, so next year if she does well over summer maybe we could find something a bit harder and hopefully get some black type.”