Former Singapore trainer hitting form

The adage of keeping your horses in the worse company and yourself in the best has been paying off for former Singapore trainer Tim Fitzsimmons.

Now based at Bendigo, Fitsimmons scored his second winner for the week when Greatham Boy took out the Roll The Dice Racing Handicap (1000m) at Bendigo on Wednesday which followed a winner at Mornington on Monday.

Fitzsimmons only saddled his first Australian runner in February and now has three winners from just 18 starters.

Sent out the $3.50 favourite under apprentice Ryan Houston, Greatham Boy led throughout in scoring by 1-¼ lengths from Commands Success ($8) with Scully ($7.50) a short-neck away third.

Greatham Boy came from Singapore and was given a handicap rating of 70 and Fitzsimmons elected to run the gelding in a benchmark 64 race first-up on Wednesday and take advantage of Houston’s 2kg claim in the provincial area.

Fitzsimmons said he was still trying to ascertain where his Singapore horses sit with their rating.

“Plenty of my horses are probably better off a grade lower, with an apprentice on, so we’ll do that with a few of them and then progress through the ratings,” Fitzsimmons told racing.com.

“He was great toda. He was a horse over there that was better ridden with a sit, so we were worried today with that barrier, but in saying that he had never run over 1000 (metres) on the turf.

“We thought we would ride him really positive, but we weren’t sure whether he would blow out in the last bit.

“He’s certainly got a lot of improvement to come.”

Fitzsimmons said while he may not be looking forward to the winter months, weather wise, any softening of the tracks would be ideal for Greatham Boy.

“He’s a handy horse,” Fitzsimmons said.

“Wet tracks he will appreciate more and hopefully he will pick up some nice races along the way.

“I’ve got no dramas running him over 1200 metres, but the way he won today, maybe we will look for something similar or even over 1100 metres.”

Earlier on the Bendigo program, Fitzsimmons’ former boss in Singapore Cliff Brown took out the bet365 Maiden with Forest Jim.