This was a good strength G2 Open handicap mile field on paper with depth and several having last run at G1 competing but track bias ruled the day once again at this venue. Tauranga is one of the most biased track towards leaders and on pacers with the pattern rampant all day (the first three races and this feature event plus the last two events) meant on a card of nine races a staggering six (66%) races were track bias enhanced. The times of these races varied from slow to solid enough so the sectionals argument is moot and also the three races that saw some run on winners were around two turns and stamina events negate track bias more often than not. The runners trailing the leaders in all those three two-turn middle distance races ran second so the track bias in play all day nearly made it a slam. Julinsky Prince trailed the leading pair to the home turn and scored by a nostril flare after not going around a rival and scraping paint the closing 200m. The visitor is not a big horse but managed the 58kg here and was winning his eighth race in twenty-eight starts. The gelding is more a wet tracker with half his career tally coming on heavy bogs but is versatile too regarding footing and direction. He clearly has a liking for Tauranga too as in three runs on this clockwise course he has won at G2 today, finished second at G2 and also ran a close up eighth. The track bias obviously suits his racing pattern. Julinsky Prince has tried G1 three times for an eighth behind Puccini, a fourth behind Shuka and a third behind Iamishwara with all those winner having failed since worryingly. The favourite Kawi was huge in defeat as after a tardy start he got used to go forward wide before ending up outside the leader at the 1000m mark. Kawi is a closer and has one strong surge so was ridden to counter the track bias today and it almost paid win dividends. He fought tooth and nail to the line but is not the same horse when used early. Lauren Tate has been running super races at G1 of late and powered home late for a good third after being tardy and well back on settling. Smartly hugged the fence and ran on the shortest way home but there were some disappointments after that though you can always forgive a miss or flop at Tauranga, Diademe, usually a leader or on pacer, was ridden sixth the outer surprisingly but can be forgiven as the mare copped a check at the 200m when things got tight centre track. The winning time of 1:35.82 is nothing flash but it was almost two seconds (twelve lengths) superior to the final event won by the leader in a Ratings 65 so was a reasonable clip overall. Too many excuses for so many in this to be seen as a fair dinkum G2 result and factoring in the blatant track bias there has to be an asterisk on the result worth even though the field had depth on paper. You could run this race many times and get a different outcome. There should however be several winners out of the race and possibly next start too when back on a hopefully fairer track.