Queensland coach Ewen McKenzie has vowed not to get ahead of himself despite being upbeat about his side's dream trial run leading into the 2011 Super rugby season.

The injury-free Reds celebrated their second out of town win on Friday night with a 38-5 drubbing of the ACT Brumbies in Darwin following last weekend's 42-15 opening trial victory over the Crusaders in Cairns.

"We've won plenty of trial games before, but what matters are the games that count," McKenzie told AAP.

"We've got two weeks to get ourselves ready."

The trial match, played at Austar Park, continued the return to fitness of captain James Horwill, who suffered a horrific knee injury last February, and Digby Ioane, who had shoulder surgery last July.

Both had stand-out games, with Horwill earning man-of-the-match honours.

"It was a very good hitout," Horwill told AAP.

"It wasn't perfect but that's what trial matches are for - to try new things.

"I'm happy with the result, but there's a little bit for us to work on.

Both the Reds and the Brumbies showed they had plenty of depth to their squads, with both coaches using the pre-season trial series to try out new strategies.

Brumbies coach Andy Friend was philosophical about the loss.

"You never like losing games of footy, but this time of the year you try different people in different positions," he told AAP.

"We had set structures we wanted to work and they probably didn't function as well as we would have liked... and our reaction on turnover ball wasn't as good as we'd like.

"We did have some good efforts out there... so that's a plus.

"I'm looking forward to the next game."

McKenzie was happy with the end result, giving all 28 of his players a run.

"You want to find out the depth of your squad - that's one of the purposes of a trial match," he said.

"We made nine changes at half time, which took a little bit off the pace," he said.

"The defence took a while to organise themselves, but after six or seven minutes we came back on song. We made a few mistakes, but finished very well."

"James Horwill played two 70-minute games, and there was a great effort by some of our guys who are a little less known but as important to us for the season."

McKenzie also saved special praise for the games of youngsters Jake Schatz, Eddie Quirk and Ben Lucas.

Horwill acknowledged the loss of focus in the second half and said the team would have to work on their discipline and not let their opponents off the hook with soft penalties going into the 2011 season.

"We let them back into the game a little bit... piggybacking on some penalties," he said.

"That's become a trend in our two trial games, so we have to work on our discipline."

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