Walker rides four winners at Benalla

Monday 16 February 2015, 6:07pm

Michael Walker has taken the lead in the Victorian jockeys' premiership with four winners at Benalla.

Walker had a fall after the finishing post in Saturday's Blue Diamond colts and geldings Prelude at Caulfield and was stood down a race later by the doctor despite saying he was fine to ride.

Walker had scans on Sunday which were all clear and he stole the show at Benalla a day later with four wins and a second from five rides for the David Hayes and Tom Dabernig stable.

The Benalla haul took Walker's season tally to 78 wins, one more than Dean Yendall in the state premiership.

The jockey has formed a successful combination with the Hayes-Dabernig partnership this season and will be hoping that can continue on a feature day at Flemington on Saturday.

He is booked to ride four horses for the stable on Lightning Stakes day, including two-year-old Stay With Me who is a daughter Miss Finland who Hayes has described as his all-time favourite.

Stay With Me is nominated to make her debut in the Listed Talindert Stakes (1100m), a race which launched the stakes-racing career of Miss Finland when she won in 2006 at her second start.

Miss Finland went on to stamp herself as a champion filly, winning the Golden Slipper, Thousand Guineas, VRC Oaks and Australian Guineas at Group One level.

Walker is also booked for three-year-old filly Wawail in the Group Three Vanity (1400m) and Gracious Prospect in a 1400m Open Handicap.

He won on both horses last start at Flemington on January 31.

Walker is also booked to ride Duck Dynasty in the CS Hayes Stakes, a race the trainers would dearly love to win.

But the maiden galloper is 23rd in the order of entry for the Group Three race and it is set to feature a number of leading Australian Guineas contenders.

The CS Hayes Stakes is named in honour of David Hayes' father and Dabernig's grandfather, the late Colin Hayes.

David Hayes has not won the CS Hayes Stakes.

– AAP

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