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| Staff Writer |
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Ciaron Maher is set to audition his second Everest hopeful as I Am Me lines up in Saturday's Gr.2 The Shorts at Randwick. The six-year-old mare will be looking to build on her impressive first-up victory in the Concorde Stakes, where she edged out stablemate and confirmed Everest runner Bella Nipotina.
I Am Me has now bested Bella Nipotina in all three of their encounters, a fact not lost on Maher's Sydney foreman Johann Gerard-Dubord. "She has been a very good horse, she hasn't won a Group One, but she has been Group One placed multiple times," Gerard-Dubord said. "She won the Sydney Stakes last year, so we know she enjoys Randwick. She was probably a couple of lengths off the better ones [in the past], but she seems to have come back like she might have improved those couple of lengths and that could be enough."
In a bid to eke out further improvement, Maher has altered I Am Me's training regime, opting to prepare her from his rural New South Wales base at Bong Bong rather than at Warwick Farm. Gerard-Dubord elaborated on the change: "We've got her at Bong Bong and she enjoys it there. She lives in a box at night, but she is in a paddock during the day. Once she has done her work in the morning, she goes in the paddock. Gallop days, she will go in the spa straight after she works."
The foreman believes this approach is yielding results, adding: "They're happy horses and we've got some beautiful tracks there too. You can give them a good base of fitness and get them very fit while still very happy and enjoying life."
With an ideal draw in barrier two and champion jockey James McDonald booked for the ride, connections are bullish about I Am Me's chances in The Shorts. The only minor concern for Gerard-Dubord is the two-week turnaround from her last run.
"That's probably the only question mark, two weeks between runs after such a good run first-up effort, but she's not showing any signs she has gone backwards," he said. "She was very good first-up, she has drawn well on Saturday, she has found a dry track. She will be hard to beat again."
The Shorts has long been a key lead-up race to The Everest, with previous winners including Classique Legend, who went on to claim The Everest in 2020. Gytrash took out The Shorts in 2021 before finishing third in The Everest, while last year's victor Nature Strip had already secured his Everest slot before adding The Shorts to his impressive resume.
With US$20 million (£15.9 million) on offer in The Everest, I Am Me will be looking to use The Shorts as a springboard to secure one of the remaining slots in Australia's richest race. A strong performance on Saturday could see her join stablemate Bella Nipotina in the field for the lucrative sprint contest.
As the countdown to The Everest intensifies, all eyes will be on Randwick this weekend to see if I Am Me can take another step towards joining the elite sprinters vying for glory in the world's richest turf race.