After leading the 2,260 metres three-year-old colts and geldings feature with a lap to go, a 26.8 seconds third split was enough for Atomic Red to shake his rivals.

The Steve Turnbull trained, Amanda Turnbull driven colt went on to claim victory in the $50,000 feature in a hot 1:56.5 mile rate.

“He sort of hides that bit of speed. He’s very tough, but I knew I had to try and to break their hearts down the back and he showed us a bit more speed tonight,” Amanda Turnbull said.

“I was just a little bit worried with the one draw if he’d get out of the gate good enough, but once he held that, it was a pretty easy drive from then on.”

The father-daughter duo went into the Gold Crown Carnival feature final looking to add to their 2014 Gold Chalice win with Mighty Gift and as a $1.20 favourite, Atomic Red was tipped to do just that.

The Rocknroll Hanover x Shoutaloud colt had to work hard early on to prevent others from crossing.

But even then he had enough left to turn on the speed down the back straight and hold off a fast finishing Astride ($5.60).

There was 2½m between the pair, with Wardan Express ($32.70) a further 3m back in third.

It was the fourth win from five starts this season for Atomic Red, who has more feature races on his radar.

“I’d say he’ll have a pretty busy year … he hasn’t finished yet,” Turnbull said.