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Dreams Aplenty for Zielke in Northern Crown Series

7 May 2019

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By Glenn Davis

Former star three-year-old Dreams Aplenty will make his comeback at the Gold Coast on Wednesday ahead of Northern Crown sprinters campaign in central and north Queensland.

Dreams Aplenty resumes in the Pernod Open Handicap (1200m) in what will be his first start back after a winless seven start campaign during the summer.

The five-year-old last appeared when he beat one runner home in a 1400-metre Open at Eagle Farm on February 23.

Dreams Aplenty was placed only twice last campaign when runner-up to Sword Of Justice at Doomben on February 9 and when third to Victorem in the Listed Lough Neagh Stakes at Doomben in December.

Dreams Aplenty was one of the State’s star three-year-olds winning the Toowoomba Guineas in 2017 before claiming the Group 3 Gunsynd Classic at Eagle Farm three weeks later.

As a two-year-old in 2016, the son of Dream Ahead ran second in the Group 2 BRC Sires’ Produce Stakes (1350m) at Doomben before a close fourth to Sacred Elixir in the Group 1 J J Atkins (1600m) at Eagle Farm.

Trainer John Zielke is looking forward to Dreams Aplenty’s return before embarking on Northern Crown sprinters campaign which kicks off with the Rockhampton Newmarket (1200m) at Callaghan Park in July.

Any sprinter which wins three of the nominated five Northern Crown features wins a $100,000 bonus while the bonus rises to $150,000 if one of those three races includes the Far North Queensland Amateurs Open Sprint in Cairns in mid-September.

The series includes the Mackay and Cairns Newmarkets as well as the Cleveland Bay Handicap in Townsville.

Zielke is delighted with the progress of Dreams Aplenty following an easy 1000-metre barrier trial win at the Gold Coast in April.

“I couldn’t be any happier with the way he’s shaping up this campaign,” Zielke said.

“He’s done really well and his trial win was very good considering he came back into work a bit later than expected.

“This is a nice race on Wednesday to kick off his campaign before he heads north.

“The plan was originally to run in the Gold Coast Cup last Saturday which is the race he won last year but he wasn’t quite ready for 1400 metres first-up.”

Zielke plans to give Dreams Aplenty one more local start before embarking on his northern campaign.

“I don’t want to overtax him too much before he heads up north so he’ll probably only have one more run here,” he said.

Racing Queensland webnews   May 7