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By Ray Hickson

Trainer Kerry Parker says he’s pleased he didn’t toss promising galloper Flying Bandit into stakes company last weekend but it’s coming soon if he can continue his rise at Randwick on Saturday.

The gelding was an acceptor for the Group 3 JRA Plate, won by Bois D’Argent, but with a couple of good options in country and provincial Cups coming up he’s happy to lower the bar slightly in the Tom Bingle Handicap (1800m).

Flying Bandit will go into the race third-up on the back of a Hawkesbury win over 1800m two weeks ago but it's still somewhat of a test of his promise.

“I’d probably prefer if this was 2000m and that’s why we had him in last week,’’ he said.

“I’m glad I didn’t go the way it panned out, nothing made ground and the leader controlled the race.

“I was tempted to run, but I didn’t think I had to deep end him just yet.

“I’m not scared of deep ending him but if he’d gone around and run a good third or fourth his rating could go through the roof.

“This is still a jump, he’s a 79 into a 94 rating but he does get in with 52.5kg and he deserves a crack at them.”

Flying Bandit wins at Hawkesbury on April 9

To offset the class rise, Flying Bandit drops 7kg on his last start win where, and perhaps the weight contributed, he took most of the Hawkesbury straight to prevail.

One of the options Parker has in front of him is to back the four-year-old up in the Wagga Cup over 2000m next week but that’ll become clearer once he’s navigated the task ahead of him.

“Everything went as planned, we needed every bit of the 1800m and probably will do again,’’ Parker said.

“The rail out 9m is a little scary for him but all in all he’s going terrific.

“We’ll go around this week and work out a plan from there.”

The Kembla Grange trainer is adamant Well Timed can resurrect his campaign after everything went wrong in the lead up to, and including, the Provincial-Midway Championships Final.

He’d run second when resuming in a Qualifier then finished last at Rosehill, a run he’s very forgiving of, and tenth in the Final with plenty of excuses.

So he’s hopeful of a return to form in the Gallipoli Handicap (1400m) at Kensington on Friday.

“His run after he qualified it was just the track, Nash just sat up on him. He wasn’t handling it all so it was a complete forgive,’’ he said.

“He drew 16 in the Final and was four and five deep no cover the whole journey but to his credit he didn’t let a horse pass him and still went very well.”

All the fields, form and replays for Saturday’s Randwick meeting