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Craig Kerry
July 30, 2026 — 5:00pm
Wyong trainer Kristen Buchanan has found the key to Hellova Nature, but it’s been far from easy.
Now Buchanan hopes the five-year-old can cash in on his career-best form and an improving Rosehill track on Saturday in the Midway Handicap.
Hellova Nature has won three of his past four starts for Buchanan after he started his time with the stable, following a move from Nathan Doyle, with eight unplaced runs.
His only loss across those runs was a strong second behind Cold Brew at Rosehill in a 1300m Midway on June 27 on a soft 6. He then went to Doomben on July 11 and scored a first metropolitan win.
Buchanan said the formula for success was as simple as “dry tracks and riding him to have one crack”, but it had been a long process.
“His early wins with a previous stable were on speed and that was all well and good, but he wasn’t finishing his races off racing like that, so I said to the guys, we’ve got to try this,” Buchanan said.
“He gives you a really nice feel when you ride him and I think he was just trying to be at his top for too far, and it didn’t flatter him.
“Then it was trying to re-teach him to settle at the start of his races, and last preparation, we hit wet tracks, wide gates, so it was really hard to reconfigure his pattern.
“But I’m delighted that it’s worked because he’s such a nice horse and he just thinks he’s the duck’s nuts at the moment.”
Hellova Nature ($5) has a handy draw in four on Saturday and apprentice Mollie Fitzgerald taking three kilograms off his 60kg topweight.
Buchanan was pleased to see Rosehill drying into the soft 5 range and she hoped the rail position of seven metres out from the 800m to winning post and six metres the remainder, would not be a disadvantage to horses running on.
“He was pretty good last time in that Midway, and the track was a bit softer than I wanted for him, but I think he’s really found his groove,” she said.
Buchanan has Fitzgerald also on Tambeloa ($11) in the fifth, a 2000m benchmark 78 handicap. The three-year-old was a close second to All Kinds Of Folk two starts back at Randwick but then was eighth there last time out with a noseband added.
“Last start I unfortunately did a gear change because I thought he was a little bit fierce,” Buchanan said.
“He can be a strong horse, so I thought I’d give him a little extra say so, and he ambled out the gates and was three-four back the fence, and getting buried when he needed to be getting forward, so I was kicking myself after the race.
“We’ve just gone back to what we had before, so give him a squeeze out of the gates and hopefully he’ll roll forward. With the rail out at Rosehill, we won’t be riding him cold.”
Buchanan also had Annie’s Rose ($17) as an emergency in the last.
“There will be enough sting out of the ground and I think she will run a good race, but I think there’s improvement to come,” she said.
