Mark Wilcox had two winners while Silent Effective made a winning return from injury in four entertaining heats of the Workers Club Goulburn Cup (457m).
Highly Respected and Natural Player both qualified for Sunday's $10,000-to-the-winner final for Wilcox, with the latter running the fastest time in the heats with a run of 25.62.
Beginning well, Natural Player quickly got into gear and the race was virtually all but over at the top of the straight, with the son of Knocka Norris running away for a four length win to Fire Elusive.
Earlier in the day, Highly Respected took out the first heat in a thrilling photo finish with All Too Fancy in a time of 26.19.
Wilcox could have had three qualifiers for the Goulburn Cup, with Knocka's Return competing in the final heat. But the winner of last year's Cup could not recover from a poor start and finished fifth.
In that same heat, Silent Effective (pictured) silenced all the doubters about whether he could overcome an injury he suffered in October, with a brilliant 25.77 victory.
Starting from box four, the Darren Sultana-trained sprinter begun moderately, but managed to rail up around the bend to win by 2 1/2 lengths over Pierro Kade.
The remaining heat was taken out by the Jason Magri-trained Classy Sahara, who held off Clonakilty Man to win in 25.78.
The Workers Club Goulburn Cup final will be run this Sunday.
The box draw for the cup is: 1. Clonakilty Man 2. Natural Player 3. Pierro Kade 4. All Too Fancy 5. Highly Respected 6. Silent Effective 7. Fire Elusive 8. Classy Sahara 9. My Awesome Opal 10. What Will Do
