The eight-year-old bay gelding has drawn two in the second row for the feature, a Group 2 race held across 2790 metres.

Fouroeight has only raced twice since the end of August, his most recent start at Dubbo on December 17, with Rue explaining that the veteran pacer had a couple of issues to sort out.

"He had some soundness issues going on, a few little niggles and it took a while to sort it out," he explained.

READ MORE:

"By the time we got to the bottom of them, it took a while to get him back to the races."

Rue, who won the 2011 Shirely Turnbull Memorial with Lightning Raider, said Sunday's edition is likely to feature one of the best fields in recent times.

"It's one of the best running of the Shirley Turnbull for a few years, I reckon," he said.

"He's going into it well. The run at Dubbo last week did him really good, but racing at this level these days is getting harder and harder on him. He's getting on a little bit, but he'll definitely run a good race anyway."

Seven horses entered for the memorial featured in at least one Inter Dominion qualifier including Make Mine Memphis, Aphorism, Loorrim Lake, Atomic Red, Ellmers Image, Bundoran and Mach Dan.

Fouroeight could've been one of those pacers with Inter Dominion experience, after he originally qualified for the qualifying heats but Rue decided to withdraw him due to his soundness issues.

One glaring omission is the Belinda McCarthy-trained Alta Orlando, the 2019 Shirley Turnbull Memorial winner scratched from Sunday's race on Wednesday morning.

McCarthy's gelding, who finished third in the Inter Dominion final at Menangle earlier this month, would've likely been the favourite for the Shirley Turnbull Memorial.

"He qualified, actually filling the last spot," he said.

"Things weren't just working out, so we had to take him out, which was disappointing.

"We knew we'd be filling up numbers being in it but it still would've been good to have him in the race."

In terms of Fouroeight barrier draw for the race, Rue was well pleased with how it came out.

"It's a perfect draw. In an ideal world it would be prefect to hop on the fence there," he said.

"Bundoran and the number two [Somebeachshadow], who will come out of number one without any scratchings, will be the two better horses in the race. Hopefully we'll jump straight on the fence behind those two ones. It'll be a good spot to be, I'd say."

Rue admitted Sunday's memorial feature will be one of the best fields Fouroeight has raced in.

"This race will definitely be up there in the top three or four races he's ever raced in," he said.

"He's raced in the Shirley Turnbull twice before, so this will be his third time in it and he's raced third and fourth in it before and both times, they've been really good races."

Last year's Shirley Turnbull Memorial winner Our Uncle Sam, trained by Chris Frisby, will not feature.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can access our trusted content: