Hissing Sid - a new stakes winner

“We planned to win this race a long time ago with him,” he said on behalf of himself and his father Bill Wilde – the pair co-trainers… “and for the plan to come off, it’s just a feeling of relief and elation.”“He was just on song today and before the race we really thought bad luck would be the only thing that could beat him in the race.”

“It was easy watching because I knew a long way out that he was going to be very tough to run down. He’s a natural stayer… he doesn’t take a lot of work and he is a pleasure to train.

”Words that could also have been spoken of his sire Golden Snake who was on his own winning streak a few years ago - over the space of six months in 2000/01 winning three Gr.1 races from four starts… adding to another big Gr1 victory recorded in June 1999. “A quality stayer” were three more words Symon Wilde used to describe Hissing Sid and they too are apt for Golden Snake – whose six victories from 15 starts ranged from 1600m to 2400m.

And now this young sire is doing the job at stud,

Champion 4 Time Gr1 Winner

Hissing Sid is his third talented stakes winner from limited opportunities. Last summer another of his sons in the shape of Gilded Venom was looking a star of the future – however his tragic death at the age of just five coming not long after his exciting Railway Stakes-Gr.1 and C.B Cox Stakes-Gr.2 victories.

But another star is on the horizon, Hissing Sid so impressive in his 1.5 length Warrnambool Cup victory under the steadier of 57kg that spring beckons.“There’s no reason why we couldn’t get him into a Caulfield Cup,” said Wilde…. “I really think that he is a very, very good stayer.”

A $25,000 Premier II graduate, Hissing Sid has won six of 13 – already amassing over $289,000 in stakes. Bred by Premier Thoroughbreds, he is out of the lightly raced At Talaq (second in Mr Lomondy’s Caulfield Cup) mare Domitrix – a granddaughter of the great mare Deck The Halls who ran third in Silver Bounty’s Caulfield Cup… so on both sides he has the right staying pedigree!

It was a good day for Golden Snake with the promising Golden Papillon flashing home for an eye-catching third in an 1100m event at his first run since the spring. Already a metropolitan winner, he looks to have a good campaign ahead.

Banana Man landed his third country Cup of the season when he carried topweight of 58.5kg to an impressive victory in the Listed Mornington Cup.

Banana Man returns to scale.

"The dangers were coming from behind him and I was thinking he had gone too early," Kent said.

However Banana Man, who won the Bendigo Cup (2400m) in November and the Colac Cup (2000m) under 60.5kg at his previous start on February 8, was simply too classy.

Rawiller said his mount was travelling so easily that going early was no issue.

"I was further back than I wanted to be but he was relaxed and I was pretty confident when we got to the front," he said.

Backed from $3.10 to start $2.80 favourite, Banana Man settled midfield before travelling sweetly into the race coming to the turn and bursting clear in the straight.

The Desert King five-year-old held on to score by three-quarters of a length from Capecover ($16), who swept home late, with Sooze ($7) a nose away third.

Kent must now decide whether to take Banana Man to New Zealand for the $1 million Group One Auckland Cup (3200m) at Ellerslie on March 4 or go for the Group Two $400,000 Adelaide Cup over the same trip at Morphettville on March 9.

"I'll take him where I think he can win," Kent said.

"I like him as a two-miler. He's an improving, progressive horse.

"He was a very immature as a young horse, he was all legs and no body, but he's grown into himself."

Banana Man made it a hat-trick of wins having won over 2000m at Caulfield on January 26.

Bred and owned by Samantha Pelly who is a track rider for the Colin Little stable, Banana Man has now won eight of his 18 starts and earned almost $380,000 in prizemoney.

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