Title Fighter to face bigger challenge at Moonee Valley

Trainer Clayton Douglas concedes Title Fighter will face a far bigger challenge when he returns to Moonee Valley for his second race start.

Title Fighter outsped his rivals to land the prize on debut at The Valley on July 29 on a track that was favouring leaders throughout the program.

The rail will move from the five-metre position into the true position for Saturday’s meeting when Title Fighter runs in the Quentin Wallace Handicap (1000m).

“It will probably be a little bit different with the rail back in the true, but he had shown good ability before that though and we thought he would be hard to beat,” Douglas said.

“He looks like he has come on a bit in the coat, but he goes up a lot in weight from his last run, but I still think he will run a good race on Saturday.”

Douglas is not getting overly ambitious with the recently turned three-year-old and elected to return to The Valley on Saturday rather than wait a week for a start at Caulfield.

He said returning Title Fighter to the course and distance he was successful at made more sense than heading to the Group 3 Vain Stakes (1100m), a race he won 12 months ago with Giga Kick.

Douglas said at this stage of the gelding’s career he is pure a sprinter, although in time he expects Title Fighter to stretch out a little in trip.

“We’ll keep things simple at this stage we’ll just take each run as it comes this campaign,” Douglas said.

“He’s not an overly big horse but he seems to be coping with everything so far and he went about it the right way last time, so that is why we’re going again.

“We missed an earlier prep with him, so we’ll be guided by him as to whether he has another one or two runs after this.

“But he’ll be a more developed horse in six months’ time, so he might be better off in the autumn.”