by Noel Ovington, USTA Web Newsroom Correspondant

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia — Impressive debut winner Emmas Only is assured of starting a short priced favorite in Friday night’s A$300,000 www.harnesslink.com Australian Pacing Gold Final (1760 meters) for two-year-old colts and geldings after drawing post position one.

Gary Wild Photo

Emmas Only was an impressive winner in a heat of the APG.

The NSW-owned and Victorian trained-colt led from barrier seven -– the outside of the front tier -– for driver Kerryn Gath at Moonee Valley and annihilated his rivals in a heat of the series on April 29. If the 18 and a half metre winning margin wasn’t impressive enough, Emmas Only sped over the mile in 1:57⁵.

Trainer Andrew Gath said he has taken Emmas Only along quietly since his heat win.

“He went into the heat very much underdone so I haven’t worked him that hard since,” he said. “But I’m very happy with what he has done.”

Gath said it was a struggle to get the son of Presidential Ball ready for the Gold series after suffering a leg injury.

“He went through a fence and his leg blew up,” he said. “It was a fairly serious injury and as a result he had to have quite a bit of time off. He’s fine now but it put his preparation back to the stage where it was touch and go whether he’d make it or not.”

Although Gath said he always knew Emmas Only had above average ability, the ease of his heat win did come as a surprise.

“He had to be an exceptional horse just to get there with the preparation he had,” Gath said. “But I was surprised how easily he won. I always had an opinion of him; I was confident he’d turn into a nice horse. But what he did in his heat was hard to believe on the preparation he had. From drawn barrier one on Friday night I expect him to be very hard to beat.”

Gary Wild Photo

The Ultimate One was also victorious in a heat of the APG.

Gath qualified two horses for the Gold Final through the Moonee Valley heats, with The Ultimate One showing a brilliant turn of speed to win after giving his rivals what appeared to be an impossible start turning for home.

The Ultimate One gradually lost ground from the back straight the final time to the point of the home turn after racing roughly. Gath, however, believes the Ultimate Falcon gelding won’t have any problems getting around the Harold Park track.

“He won’t handle it any worse that Moonee Valley, put it that way,” he said. “Harold Park is a great track. I love racing there. It’s not biased in any way; horses can come from anywhere and win. The Ultimate One has plenty of ability -– as he showed in his heat win -– but he is his own worst enemy. Even so, he’s won his last four starts doing plenty of things wrong and that’s the sign of a good horse.”

The Ultimate One will start from post three with the emergency (Apaches Atom) out.

“I’m happy with the draw,” Gath said. “He comes out of the gate okay so three is not a bad place to be.”

Gath said both his Gold Finalists are owned by their breeders.

“Emmas Only is owned by Alan Butler, who lives in NSW,” he said. “Alan actually sent me down Emmas Only’s half-brother, Boosterama, to train but he only had one start for me. The association started from there.”

The Ultimate One is owned by Gold Coast-based Norm Jenkin, best known as the owner of former champion mare, Exceptionally Smooth.

Jenkin has already tasted Australian Pacing Gold success with Surfers Paradise, who took out the 1996 fillies’ division.

Gath and Jenkin have also gone close to winning the colts and gelding division twice with True Cam, who finished second to Lombo Skyrider in 2001 at Harold Park, and last year with Non Committal, who was runner-up to Kathryn Dancer at Brisbane’s Albion Park.

Gath will head north on Thursday and will stable both horses at Darren Hancock’s Pheasants Nest property.

“Both are very relaxed horses and they travel well, so there’s no need to head to Sydney any earlier,” Gath said. “I think both horses are capable of winning, but there are a lot of nice horses in the race so I’m certainly not going into the race over-confident.”