Drummer Boy ready for big run

Having shown his hand in back-to-back overnight allowance races to start the new year, placing third and second, four days apart, DRUMMER BOY looks ready to win his first-ever race at the level he was forced to skip after winning the Lotto Classic Governor’s Cup.

Running with the handicaps in his favour, DRUMMER BOY caught last year’s Governor’s Cup field napping and stole the event with veteran jockey Gary Richards, a victory that unfairly propelled him straight to open allowance – even after performing woefully in the Derby and St Leger.

Outclassed, DRUMMER BOY spent the rest of the season toiling between open allowance and grade one before getting a pass to overnight allowance, seven months later, finishing fifth at eight and a half furlongs behind SUPERLUMINAL mid-December.

Now at a level at which he can be competitive, DRUMMER BOY takes on 14 rivals at seven furlongs this afternoon, eased a bit in the handicaps at 120lb after the 123lb floored him on January 5, allowing back-to-form PAKMAN 13lb at six and a half furlongs.

Prior to that run, DRUMMER BOY was outstayed at nine furlongs and 25 yards on New Year’s Day by a rallying SECRET TRAVELLER, exposing his stamina limitations under topweight 126lb.

Though DRUMMER BOY’s main rivals – LICI’S PEPSI, MY SISTER and BIRDIE MY LOVE – are all 10lb lighter, the first two are fillies and the latter a six-year-old mare, going up against a colt, who beat his classic peers last season.

DRONE STRIKE, last year’s Derby winner, who has only raced three times since, the last being a ­farcical Diamond Mile effort, is yet to get more than a half-mile gallop at exercise this season, hence he cannot be fancied against the fitter runners.

Despite giving up 10lb to the fillies and BIRDIE MY LOVE, DRUMMER BOY has pace on his side. They prefer sitting off the early fractions before making their moves on the far turn. DRUMMER BOY, however, is most comfortable in front and has Omar Walker aboard, a rider who doesn’t hang around to ­exchange pleasantries once he sees the three-pole.

Unless one of the fillies, or BIRDIE MY LOVE, decides to test him early, which could be ­detrimental to their winning chances, DRUMMER BOY should be relatively comfortable on the lead, catching a second wind after the first half-mile and ready to go whenever Walker asks him to run.