Storm Boy will favour the Slipper over the Diamond so he need not worry (for now at least) about the winners of the Blue Diamond Previews on Friday, but he and connections would've taken notice in the first at Randwick on Saturday.

The Coomore owned, Waller trained, $1.5 million Snitzel colt Switzerland certainly has everything behind him to be good, and good is exactly what he looks.

Only 1000m there and against likely limited opposition ($26 and $151 chances filling the placings is a slight red flag) but a rating of 107 is a good starting point.

Especially when considering Storm Boy himself ran to 107 in his first two starts, it gives a good indication of what sort of level you need to establish early to be considered a genuine chance in a race like the Golden Slipper.

More than anything, I think it just goes to show how much water there is to go under the bridge before these big races, with plenty of top horses still to debut and ratings pushing 120 still likely to be run before the main events.

That said, I think it is fair enough that High Octane is into a narrow favourite to win the Blue Diamond.

He was a fairly well spruiked colt, another million dollar colt, this time for Newgate and the Snowdens, and has run a strong rating of 105+ on debut in the Listed Blue Diamond Preview (C&G) (1000m).

Why the fillies counterpart race is a Group 3 on the same day (breeding page) is another story, but the boys have out-rated the girls fairly comfortably.

High Octane was the third-fastest last 400m of the meeting, behind horses in the 1000m listed sprint, and second-placed Holmes A Court (also for the Snowdens) put 3 lengths on third.

Over the past five years, the winning average of the boys preview has been 106.2 so High Octane is about average, especially considering his + potential, and interestingly enough is only rated higher (in the past five years) than the only horse who actually went on to win the Blue Diamond, Daumier (103>113).

Hayasugi was just under a length slower than High Octane when winning the fillies division and has run to 97, up from her debut peak of 92 behind Bold Bastille.

The Blue Diamond may end up revolving a bit around Bold Bastille, who has had a small set back. Her rating of 105 on debut at Moonee Valley still looks strong, but whether the Blue Diamond ends up coming too quickly for her might be the main issue.

Meanwhile, there wasn't much between the three-year-olds that split into the Australia Stakes and Manfred Stakes.

Veight proved too good against the older horses but a rating of 113 is well below what that race usually takes to win and that was evident prior given a horse like Recommendation was backed into $3.20 second favourite and is a solid listed horse around the 110 mark rather than a Group 2 class sprinter.

That is still technically a new peak rating for Veight, up from 111, which he ran to in 3/4 starts last campaign, and he really should be better over further. I'd be very wary of backing him in a race like the Group 1 Newmarket Handicap (1200m) which has been floated. He should be targeting the Australian Guineas, which is still a possibility.

Veight (113) and Southport Tycoon (112) narrowly bettered Brave Mead (110) in the Manfred who led all of the way ahead of a big run from King Colorado (109) and a fair effort from Steparty (104).

King Colorado is easily the horse to take out of that, running the fastest splits of the race and looking right on track for races over 1600m-2000m with the Guineas the obvious target- he's now into equal favourite with Saturday's Almanzor Trophy and NZ 2000 Guineas winner Crocetti (107), along with Veight.

It'll be interesting to see if something can take that next step in the three-year-old division, because Griff's Caulfield Guineas win over a fair few of these horses rated poorly. Of course it matters little if they all end up racing each other again, but there is certainly an opportunity for something to put their hand up over the coming weeks.