Stockyard Gate wins a third from five, this time off 20 numbers

Stockyard Gate held 20 of the 1,000 numbers in the Class B Flat at Mallee Park and won it. That is 2.0 per cent, the smallest block any winner has held on this circuit, and the declared win dividend of $40.78 is the largest the programme has returned.

The draw is published as MAL-R4-4E8604, seed 4e86046e63ab3152, settled at 14:43 on a book of 122.7 across ten runners. The drawn order opened 1, 3, 8, 5, so number one came out first and nothing after it mattered. Ninepin, on 151 numbers, was second at 2.2 lengths. Fence Line, on 223, was third at 4.3. Bitumen held 315 numbers, 31.5 per cent and the largest block in the field, and finished fourth, 7.2 lengths back.

The number worth keeping is further down the card. Half Mast also held 20 numbers and was also priced at $40.78, the same block and the same implied probability of 2.5 per cent. Half Mast came out last in the drawn order and was beaten 27 lengths. Two runners, identical weightings, first and tenth, and nothing between them except the order the numbers left the draw.

It was Stockyard Gate's third win from five starts, at prices with nothing to do with each other. The Trial at Wattle Hill: 67 numbers, 6.7 per cent, $12.78, a short half-head from Bitumen, with the 255-number favourite Marble Bar third at 2.5 lengths. The Class A Synthetic at Tin Creek: 152 numbers, 15.2 per cent, $5.51, three-quarters of a length from Paper Lantern, with Ninepin on 273 numbers fourth. Then Mallee Park on 20.

Between the second and third of those it ran tenth of twelve in the Class C Sprint at Saltbush Flat, off 21 numbers, 20 lengths behind Half Mast. Its form string now reads 4-4-1-1-0-1 and its career record 43-9-5-3, a strike rate of 20.9 per cent.

Priya Sandhu rode the first two winners, Kaz Tupou the third, and Faisal Karim trains it. The horse is the same horse in all five races and the engine is the same engine. What changed each time was how many of the 1,000 numbers the card gave it, a figure fixed when the card is published and printed in full beside the field.

Stockyard Gate is in seven of the thirteen cards ahead, on blocks of 56, 259, 317, 136, 59, 192 and 24. It is the top block in the Saltbush Dash and the Coorong Nightcap and holds 2.8 per cent for the Bellbird Steeple. None of the five results above makes the slightest difference to any of them.