Splintex breaks through at second start

Mark Newnham’s late-season two-year-old team continues to blossom with Splintex winning at Randwick.

Splintex has shown the benefit of his first race experience to lead all the way in the two-year-old maiden at Randwick.

Trained by Mark Newnham, Splintex ran third on debut on April 22 and set a quick pace in Saturday’s 1000m-race on the Kensington track to record a class record 56.55sec.

With Josh Parr aboard, Splintex ($5.50) held off the $3.70 favourite Spaceboy by three-quarters of a length.

“He did take good improvement from that first-up run last Monday week,” Newnham said.

“Josh jumped on him on Tuesday morning and you could see the benefit of having that run and he hit the line strongly and pulled up well. He is just a really nice little horse, nearly foolproof.

“We have got a few nice late season two-year-olds now.

“We had Diamond Thunder who won on Wednesday, this chap and a few more to come out in the next few weeks so hopefully we will have a good end to the two-year-old season.”

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Parr said he was never going to give up the lead.

“When they jump like that it is almost like free ground,” he said.

“You never give that away. I was quick to ask him to improve and go to the front and go to the fence. He raced really well from that point on.”

His win was the first leg of an early double at the meeting for Parr who rode We Concur ($3.70 fav) to win the Highway Handicap.

We Concur gave Murwillumbah trainer Matt Dunn his 22nd win in a Highway race for country-trained horses.

“He has a high head carriage and can be a bit awkward,” Parr said.

“But he was the progressive type in the race and won accordingly.”

We Concur had half a length on the Danny Williams-trained Laughing Or Crying.