Mansetti made it 5 wins from 8 starts for trainer Kevin Attard in the King’s Plate Stakes at Woodbine on Saturday afternoon, but he certainly did it the hard way. Drawn low in stall 1, Mansetti broke quickly from the stalls to hold a prominent position, opening with furlong splits of 12.38 and 10.92s to get to the front as the field rounded the first turn. That early speed proved to be the key to his victory, as he led the field down the back straight and around the far turn before kicking away off the home bend. He was the fastest horse in furlongs 7, 8 and 9 and was as much as 4-lengths ahead as he approached the final furlong pole. Pietro Moran had his mount ideally placed, but having shared the lead with the eventual 4th, Scorching, for much of the opening 6-furlongs, Mansetti was able to quicken off the turn and was 0.55s faster than Scorching over that 3-furlong stretch. A race finishing speed of 96% confirms the visual impression that this was run at a strong gallop and given that his top speed figure of 41.32 mph ranked him 7th in the field, track position clearly played an important part in the way the race panned out, especially for a winner whose average stride length (23.88 ft) was one of the shortest of the 13-runner field. Stall 1 perhaps forced Moran’s hand, but he used his mount’s high stride frequency to get into the key position and if we compare Mansetti to the horse drawn in stalls 2 and 3, we find that he was 0.71 and 0.42s quicker than either of them to the first turn. Mansetti is a relatively compact son of Collected and he hasn’t ranked in the top 3 for stride length data in any of his 3 most recent starts, but what he does possess is a rapid turn-of-foot that allows him to get into a prominent racing position. All 5 career wins have come at Woodbine, but this was his first try at the 10-furlong trip and his stamina was pushed to the limit. A final furlong time of 13.69s ranked 7th and his average stride length had dropped to a race low of 6.6m at that point, a drop of 0.54m from furlongs 8 to 10, but he held on to win by 2-lengths. He’s clearly a very talented winner with a turn-of-foot that is perfectly suited to race on the dirt, but the data would suggest that he has got away with 10-furlongs and a return to a mile may be more suitable in future.