Most-improved Don Kwesi, Wall Street Trader to go shoe for shoe

DON KWESI, the most improved local-bred of last season, makes his overnight-allowance debut in the midweek Ash Wednesday Trophy after flattening foreigners, AMERICAN AVIATOR and FRED THE MASTER, in back-to-back races.

Though cutting back in distance to six and a half furlongs, DON KWESI reports among the lighter runners at 114lb, with claiming rider Demar Williams now inseparable after notching three wins aboard the four-year-old in his last five outings.

Blessed with tactical middle-distance speed and a bold running style, DON KWESI took on Jason DaCosta’s foreigners down the backstretch of both races before pouring it on in sub-1:13.0 fractions for six furlongs.

American WALL STREET TRADER, on his second run back among overnight-allowance company, is the lone speed factor capable of testing DON KWESI after trying to match strides with out-of-class NAUTICAL STAR in the St Catherine Cup a month ago.

Running with a featherweight 102lb last July, WALL STREET TRADER stunned two-time Mouttet Mile runner-up LEGACY ISLE, coming from behind at six furlongs in the Thoroughbred Hall of Fame Stakes.

Dangerous at six and a half furlongs, clocking 1:18.4 at the trip last March, WALL STREET TRADER’s handers appear supremely confident, calling in Christopher Mamdeen to ride at topweight 126lb, as opposed to utilising a claiming rider.

That decision, however, could backfire, allowing DON KWESI 12lb in what could be a match race on the lead.

Being the lighter speed factor, DON KWESI has nothing to lose on the lead with no doubts surrounding his fitness. Trainer Barrington Bernard watched DON KWESI gallop five furlongs in 1:01.0 out the mile chute a week ago, sending a resounding message to WALL STREET TRADER, ‘catch me if you can’.