Todd confident Marketplace will be on the job in The Velocity
Matt Markham - Raceform • November 13th, 2025 2:27 PM
Regan Todd has been searching for that little bit extra with star three-year-old Marketplace, and he believes he’s found it ahead of Friday’s Hill Lee & Scott The Velocity.And that could well spell a payday for punters and trouble for the colt’s rivals in the $500,000 slot race as part of Show Day at Addington.
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Beaten in all three starts this campaign, a little of the gloss surrounding Marketplace has faded with each run. But the man who knows him best is confident that the addition of a key piece of gear this week can allow him to shine bright once more.
“We’ve added the blinds back to his gear this week and I think it will make a big difference,” Todd told RaceForm.
“We took him into Addington on Saturday morning for a hitout and I was bloody rapt with the way he went. The blinds really switched him on, and he really went with the galloping pacemaker when we asked him to and was right up on the bit.”
It’s a rather foreign scenario that Todd, driver Craig Ferguson and Marketplace’s many connections have found themselves in over the past few weeks, given that for the majority of his career, they’ve enjoyed dominant success. But while they have been out to win every time they’ve raced, it’s all been about the two greater goals, starting with this week’s slot race and then on to the New Zealand Derby next Friday night.
“When we sat down to work out the plan for this campaign, it was done backwards from those two races. Every public run was part of the plan with the view to having him ready for two massive races.”
Outpointed by the toughness of Got The Chocolates in his last two runs, a lot has been said about Marketplace’s unwillingness to race up on the bridle, especially when in front. Todd isn’t concerned about that in the slightest and believes that, with the blinds on this week, he’ll be right on the job from the outset.
“He’s a pretty casual horse at the best of times, but we’ve kept the blinds off him on purpose and you’ll see a difference in him this week.
“It’s not like he’s been going bad either. We’ve been beaten by a very, very good horse twice now, but we get the chance to turn the tables.”
Boosting Marketplace’s chances on Friday is a beautiful draw of barrier two from behind the mobile, which, with his gate speed, has him mapping to lead and not look back over the 1980 metres.
“We couldn’t have asked for a better marble.”
Another match race looks on the cards, with Got The Chocolates drawn wider out in barrier six, meaning he’ll have to sit outside Marketplace and try and beat him once again.
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