From the outside of the arm the Bankstown Cup presents big test for Ants and Make Way

It will take all the guile of top horseman Anthony Butt to land Make Way a winner in Friday night’s A$14,950 Bankstown Cup.

But despite drawing the outside of the front row in a strong field, Butt and his partner trainer Sonya Smith believe Lincoln Farms’ horse will be hard to beat.

“It’s a good field and being on the outside means he’ll have to do work at some stage but I’m very happy with him,” says Butt. “He’s training great and hasn’t missed a beat since Penrith.”

Make Way continued his unbeaten march this season with a near track record win at Penrith on November 7, clocking a 1:56.4 mile rate for the 2125 metres.

On Friday night he steps up to 2540 metres on the tricky 805 metre Bankstown circuit, which has a short 187 metre run home and no passing lane.

Bankstown is only 805 metres and is not well banked, with its turns having a radius of only 68.“It’s a tricky track, not one of the better half mile tracks,” says Butt. “The turns are tight and it’s not well banked so you don’t want to end up in the wrong spot.

“Generally you need to be up on the pace so I’ll be going forward, but just how quickly I don’t know.

“The good ones are on the second row so I want to keep ahead of them but there’s speed inside him too so it’s unlikely he’ll find the pegs.

“But that won’t worry him. Hopefully we can mooch across and find a spot.”

Butt says with his good gate speed Make Way should be able to get into play against what is basically the quality of opposition he expected.

“He’s up in that grade now so we have to take on the better ones and it will be a good test for him.

“But he makes it easy for us. He’s the perfect little racehorse, he eats up, trains as good as you want him to and nothing worries him.”

Course stats for Bankstown show how much of an advantage it is to draw handy and how hard it is to win from the outside of the arm.

While 16.5% and 20.1% of horses drawn the inside two spots have won this season, the strike rate drops to 8.7% from gate six, the outside of the arm.

Make Way is no ordinary animal though with his own impressive stats. His career winning strike rate is 30.7% - with 12 wins from only 39 starts - and he’s been placed in 58.9% of his races.

In Australia he marks even better with a 50% winning strike rate - nine wins from 18 starts - and a 77.7% placed record.

* Make Way will start from five if the emergency Destiny Warrior fails to make the field.

Make Way races at 11.03pm NZ time at Bankstown on Friday night.