Queensland stallion Better Than Ready continues to rack up winners after bringing up his 49th winner of the season last weekend. Two year-old filly Better Than Best was a dominant 5.8 length winner at Ipswich on Sunday. Prepared by Tony & Maddy Sears at Toowoomba, Better Than Best was bred by well known Brisbane racing identity Andrew Grant-Taylor, and retained to race. Grant-Taylor has enjoyed good success in recent times thanks to the deeds of the recently retired I Am Invincible filly, Invincibella, a $3m earner for the Chris Waller Star Thoroughbreds combination. Sunshine Coast was the main metropolitan meeting in Queensland for the week and this heralded a sparkling debut win for another Better Than Ready two year-old filly. Eelloh defeated a strong line up of two year-olds on debut over 1200m for Eagle Farm trainer Desleigh Forster. Among the Eelloh ownership group is respected Brisbane racing administrator Mary Collier. Collier has enjoyed good success with a number of high class gallopers from the Forster yard including Adebesi and Chapter And Verse. Eelloh was an inexpensive $20,000 yearling purchase from the 2019 QTIS Magic Millions March Sale. Bred by Basil Nolan’s Raheen Stud, Eelloh is named after the popular seventies band, Electric Light Orchestra (better known by the abbreviation ELO). Rounding out a trio of winners for Better Than Ready was the long priced Gold Coast winner Iced. Recording his third win, Iced defeated a good group of three year-olds including Moonee Valley winner, Ruuca who was a warmly supported favourite for the Toby & Trent Edmonds camp. Standing at Queensland’s historic Lyndhurst Stud, Better Than Ready has been an amazing success at stud with 23 winners from his first crop in the 2018-19 season. His second crop has pushed him further up the breeding premiership tables and he must rate as the leading stallion in Queensland. At last month’s Magic Millions Sale on the Gold Coast he was to top performing stallion when his 35 of 41 yearlings on offer sold for an aggregate of $1,548,000 at an average of $44,229. The success of Better Than Ready’s first crop has been observed by breeders and he attracted 216 mares last spring while he covered 236 mares in the 2018 spring. Better Than Ready commenced his stallion career in 2015 and attracted a $9900 service fee for his first four seasons until his brilliant first crop results saw the fee boosted to $33,000 last spring. His major Queensland rival Spirit Of Boom served 170 mares last spring while his 2018 book was 218 mares. Spirit of Boom stood his first season in 2014 for $11,000 and that fee was maintained until 2018 when it was increased to $55,000 before being lowered to $44,000. OnTrack two year-old fillies Always On Show and Foxy Rippa have indicated both have bright futures with strong public trial performances in recent weeks. Always On Show is prepared at Newcastle by Kris Lees and she’s a daughter of highly successful shuttle stallion Showcasing. A product of one of New Zealand’s most successful studs, Haunui Farm, Always On Show was purchased at the Magic Millions June Sale on the Gold Coast by Ontrack’s Grant Morgan. She is a full-sister to Intrigue who was Group 2 placed as a three-year-old in New Zealand last year before crossing the Tasman for a Queensland winter campaign which netted a win over ground on the Sunshine Coast. Always On Show has trialled twice for Kris Lees for an impressive win on her home track before running a close third after sitting three wide at her next trial. Foxy Rippa was purchased out of the same Gold Coast sale by Grant Morgan for champion Eagle Farm trainer Tony Gollan. She is a half-sister to Gollan’s big winning sprinter I’m A Rippa, the winner of 8 races and more than $1 million, with a Magic Millions Sprint among his victories. I’m A Rippa is the first foal of Derippa and she’s also left the winner Jack Derippa and the placed She’s Our Rippa. Derippa’s other live foal is a colt by Spirit of Boom born last spring. Foxy Rippa was sent to the Deagon trials on Tuesday morning and she ran out a nice winner in the hands of stable rider Alannah Fancourt. She comfortably defeated the Chris Anderson prepared Plutocrat, a winner at Doomben at her only race day outing. An excellent second season has seen Brazen Beau’s new season fee remain unchanged in spite of Darley lowering service fees for most of its stallions. Brazen Beau will stand the 2020 season at a fee of $49,500 inc GST. Brazen Beau was Ontrack’s champion three-year-old sprinter in the 2014-15 season with Group One wins in the Coolmore Stakes and Newmarket Handicap and he went to stud in 2015 at Darley’s Northwood Park, Victoria. He is currently the leading second season sire of stakes winners thanks to Group 2 victors Pretty Brazen and Colada and Black Type winning colt Ideas Man. He has left seven Black Type winners, the latest being Larimer Street who won the Listed Valley Pearl at Moonee Valley on Friday, 20 March. Another interesting winner for Brazen Beau last week was Potentia, who cleared maidens at Geelong after running second on debut for Team Hawkes. The highest priced yearling at the 2018 Inglis Classic Sale when purchased by Orbis Bloodstock for $480,000, Portentia is the first foal and first winner from Group 3 winning Written Tycoon mare Written Dash. Written Dash has proven to be a great investment for Tyreel Stud, bought by Belmont Bloodstock for $410,000 at the Magic Millions Broodmare Sale when in foal to Brazen Beau with Potentia the result of the mating. Her second foal is the Exceed And Excel colt Osamu who made $1.7 million at the Inglis Easter Sale. He has been Group 2 placed. A colt by I Am Invincible, made $700,000 at Inglis Easter this month when bought by the Hong Kong Jockey Club and the mare has a weanling filly by the same sire. Darley’s Kelvinside Stud in New South Wales is always a highlight of the Ontrack Hunter Valley Horse and Wine Tour and this spring the property will highlight plenty of new stallion talent.
Talented colt Microphone (by Exceed and Excel) will stand his first season at $38,500 and he’ll be joined by brilliant European juvenile Too Darn Hot (by Dubawi) at $44,000. Heading the Kelvinside roster this spring are champion sire Exceed And Excel at $132,000 (up from $$88,000) and Lonhro at $66,000 (down from $77,000). Gold Coast trainers Toby and Trent Edmonds are making the most of Covid 19 zone racing. In an effort to keep racing going in the Sunshine State, Racing Queensland divided racecourses into zones and the Edmonds team is predominantly racing at the Gold Coast, Ipswich and Toowoomba tracks. Last Friday at there home track, the Edmonds stable saddled up five individual winners to repeat a similar haul at a 12 race Sunshine Coast meeting a few seasons ago. ThOn Sunday they won an Ipswich race to take their season tally to 100. Of the wins 43 have been in Queensland metro meetings, 37 at provincial level and there’s been 19 at country New South Wales tracks and one in Victoria. Ontrack has eight horses on the Edmonds roster and the promising filly Baroda is due to be their next runner in the all gold. She resumed with a very nice run for third at the Gold Coast a couple of weeks back and is likely to be back in action in a QTIS 3YO race on her home track on May 1. Provided she runs up to expectations, Baroda could head to Sydney to contest the $200,000 Inglis Scone Guineas. The latest addition to the Edmonds Ontrack roster is a lovely filly by Black Caviar's sire Bel Esprit. Secured at last months Magic Millions QTIS Sale, the filly is out of the 2yo stakeswinner Flamenco. This Queensland bred filly was from the Daandine Stud draft. This is the prolific stakes winner getting farm that produced Golden Slipper winner Capitalist and also leading sire Written Tycoon. New Zealand studs and stables have enjoyed an unbelievable run of success at the Sydney autumn carnival. While the Kiwi industry is in lockdown due to Covid 19, horses bred in New Zealand or trained by New Zealanders made plenty of hay at the Sydney showcase. There were 22 Group Ones contested at the carnival and the washup reveals Kiwi-bred or trained gallopers have won 7 Group Ones and were placed on another 13 occasions. Ontrack’s New Zealand Horse and Wine Tour each November is a highlight of the year and previous tour members will be familiar with many of the studs that have produced these Black Type performers. Waikato Stud and Cambridge Stud are always an eye opening experience for those on the tour and the latest Group One winner from New Zealand was Tofane in Saturday’s All Aged Stakes. She is a daughter of Ocean Park who stands at Waikato Stud alongside the country’s champion stallion Savabeel, who was represented by another autumn Group One winner in Probabeel (Surround Stakes). Interestingly the All Aged Stakes was also the Group One event which Waikato Stud stallion Tivaci won in 2017 before being retired to stud. Tivaci’s first foals were sold at yearling sales around Australasia this summer and they met with tremendous support. In fact, there was such fantastic support that Waikato Stud declined an approach by the English National Stud to shuttle Tivaci to stand a Northern Hemisphere season. There’s just no denying the first lady of racing. When Con Te Partiro stormed to victory in the Group One Coolmore Legacy at Randwick on Saturday for Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott it marked the 143rd Group One for Gai. This autumn the stable has notched Group Ones with Con Te Partiro (2), Farnan and Shout The Bar. Gai had reached 120 Group One winners before she joined forces with Adrian Bott in 2016 and their first major winner together was Thronum and their first Group I winner was Global Glamour in the 2016 Sydney Airport Flight Stakes. Only her late father Tommy Smith (282) and Bart Cummings (266) have trained more Group One winners than Gai. Gai has been recuperating from surgery in recent weeks and hasn’t been attending race meetings, but she’s definitely not just a passenger in the training partnership. Her social media postings show the joy she gets from every success and training partner Adrian Bott confirms Gai is in constant phone contact every waking hour. Client communications have been a strong point for Gai over the seasons and Ontrack owners in Gallant Mist have enjoyed the depth of information the Waterhouse-Bott stable deliver with their Lohnro colt who has just completed his first preparation at Tulloch Lodge. The information comes through like clockwork each week and is detailed and informative and is always a reminder why Gai is the undisputed Queen of racing. Two Group wins at Randwick have catapulted super stallion Snitzel into breeding’s elite. Splintex (Group 2 Arrowfield Stakes) and Away Game (Group 2 Percy Sykes Stakes) were his Black Type winners on the final day of The Championships. The wins gave Snitzel his 100th and 101st individual Stakes winners and put him back on top of the current Australian General Sires’ Premiership. It puts him elite company as he joins Coolmore's Fastnet Rock (156) and Darley's Exceed And Excel (167) as the only two other active sires to notch 100 stakes winners. Other Australian-bred Champion Sires to achieve that mark include Encosta De Lago (115) and Snitzel's own sire Redoute's Choice (219). These days standing for $220,000 at Arrowfield Stud, Snitzel is guaranteed to leave a host of major winners in the seasons to come. Last year he attracted 141 mares while in 2018 he covered 172 and his 2017 book was 216. The interesting thing about Snitzel will be watching his sons forge their own stallion careers. His sons at stud include Trapeze Artist, Sizzling, Russian Revolution, Shamus Award, Wandjina, Odyssey Moon and Sooboog . Of interest to Ontrack is Sooboog as Grant Morgan purchased a colt by the stallion at last month’s Magic Millions QTIS Sale on the Gold Coast. Sooboog is a big, strong chestnut and stands at Kitchwin Hills in New South Wales where he’s been very popular with books of 152 (2017), 178 (2018) and 93 (2019) in his first three years at stud. Some major stables have purchased yearlings by Sooboog and if his first crop of yearlings is any indication, he will be soon joining his dad on the Australian Sires Premiership. Ontrack’s promising mare Arctic Shock is ready to build on her sensational return to racing. Arctic Shock resumed at Bendigo at the end of March and ran a bottler, steaming home to be beaten in a photo finish after racing three wide for most of the race. That was her first race since scoring an impressive win at Moonee Valley last November in the hands of Craig Williams. The daughter of Shocking is poised to return to winning form in the $60,000 Neds Handicap over 1400 metres at Caulfield tomorrow. Purchased out of the 2017 New Zealand Bloodstock Premier Sale at Karaka by Ontrack’s Grant Morgan for $65,000, Arctic Shock has raced only 14 times for three wins and seven minor placings and $134,790 in earnings. Arctic Shock was one of five yearling purchased by Ontrack at the sale and four of them have been winners, including the good sprinter Tavisan who has been a multiple placegetter in Listed company for Caulfield trainers Mick Price and Michael Kent Junior. The future plans remain uncertain for Arctic Shock due to the current Covid 19 restrictions. Originally her campaign was to include the Queensland Winter Carnival in a bid to win Black Type races. However those plans are being reassessed because the carnival was originally scrapped before last Friday’s partial reinstatement of some feature racing. Racing’s twists and turns might favour Ontrack’s speed horse Tavisan this weekend. Tavisan was down to resume his new campaign at Caulfield last Saturday but trainers Mick Price and Michael Kent Junior elected to save the horse after he showed signs that he was in need of more work when galloping last week. They have switched the horse to the Listed $100,000 Furphy Stakes (1000m) at Morphettville Parks this Saturday after that race was switched from the Easter meeting at Oakbank. Because of the coronavirus the Oakbank Easter Carnival has been abandoned and the Furphy Stakes is one of several races switched to Adelaide instead. Tavisan hasn’t been to the races since November when he was well beaten at Ballarat, but three starts ago he was a brilliant winner of the $100,000 Apache Cat Classic at Cranbourne.
The son of Tavistock was in brilliant form last time with wins at Sandown and Moonee Valley as well as the Cranbourne feature. He’s had a solid preparation at Price and Kent’s Warrnambool operation and his programme has included plenty of beach work along with a visit to Camperdown for a course proper gallop as well as a jump out. The 1000 metres at Morphettville Park looks an ideal assignment for the son of Tavistock who has won twice over the trip and is a very good performer fresh up from a spell, being unbeaten first-up in two Australian preparations. Queensland’s first week under the new racing regime proved fruitful for a trio of Ontrack trainers. Metro meetings were held at the Gold Coast (Friday) and Doomben (Saturday) and leading the way were champion trainer Tony Gollan (three wins), Toby and Trent Edmonds (three wins) and David Vandyke (two wins). All three stables have significant numbers of Ontrack gallopers and they look destined to play major roles during the zoned racing strategy designed by Racing Queensland to get us through the Covid 19 situation. Tony Gollan and David Vandyke compete in Zone 1 (Brisbane and Sunshine Coast) while Edmonds Racing competes in Zone 2 (Gold Coast, Ipswich and Toowoomba). The new system will see stables having to compete in their allotted zones and horses won’t be able to race in any other Queensland zone until the end of the current Covid 19 outbreak. Ontrack has some promising young horses about to resume from spells or kick off their racing preparations and while planning programmes is going to be challenging, we will endeavour to find the most suitable race for all our horses. Several of these horses were spelled in readiness for the Queensland Winter Carnival, which had to be abandoned due to the pandemic.
Racing Queensland is currently working through the issue of what to do with feature races over coming months and hopefully some of Ontrack’s promising young horses are presented with chances to race in good company in the near future. Quick Thinker’s tough AJC Derby win provided another Group One for a magic cross with stallion So You Think. Quick Thinker, who provided So You Think with his sixth Group One winner, is out of Acoumpalas, a mare by Danehill’s son Al Maher. Amazingly four of So You Think’s Group One winners are out of mares by sons of Danehill. They are Inference and D’Argento, who were out of mares by Redoute’s Choice, Nakeeta Jane who is out of a Flying Spur mare and Quick Thinker. Quick Thinker’s tough AJC Derby win provided another Group One for a magic cross with stallion So You Think. So You Think is one of racing’s rock stars with his outrageous good looks and he was a genuine international superstar of the world turf. Born in New Zealand he was born at Windsor Park Stud and he was purchased at the 2009 Karaka Premier Sale for $110,000 by legendary trainer Bart Cummings on behalf of Malaysian owner Dato Tan Chin Nam. The winner of two Cox Plates for Bart, So You Think was controversially sold to Coolmore Stud and sent to Aidan O’Brien’s stables in Ireland. He raced 11 times in Ireland, England, France, the USA and Dubai and won five Group Ones and a Group Three in the Northern Hemisphere. He retired with 10 Group Ones on his resume and was rated 133 by Timeform - The highest-rated Australian colt of the modern age. Higher-rated than Pierro, All Too Hard, and Dundeel. So You Think’s sons and daughters are enjoying a stellar run on Australian track with eight winners of Black Type races and another eight placegetters. All told he’s had 97 individual winners so far this season. So You Think stands at Coolmore Stud in the Hunter Valley and the near black horse is always one of the most popular stallions on the Ontrack Hunter Valley Horse and Wine Tour each October. His striking physique always takes tour members by surprise but it’s his sweeping mane and massive forelock that are his most famous hallmarks. Ontrack boss Grant Morgan’s decision to buy a grey colt at last June’s Magic Millions Sale proved to be a masterstroke. The Not A Single Doubt colt was a son of Warpath and that pedigree is flying with both the stallion and mare in rare form recently. Not A Single Doubt has left Group One winners Farnan (Golden Slipper) and Shout The Bar (Vinery Stakes) on consecutive Saturdays and Warpath’s breeding record is not far behind. On Saturday her daughter Positive Peace extended a wonderful run of winning form to lead all the way in the Group Two Emancipation Stakes to extend her run to five consecutive wins in Sydney. Ontrack’s grey colt is Warpath’s sixth live foal and she has now had five foals to race and all have been winners. The Not A Single Doubt-Warpath colt was offered at the Gold Coast June Sale in the Bhima Thoroughbreds Draft and Grant Morgan purchased him for $70,000. His dam Warpath is a seven times winning daughter of Reset and her form is not too dissimilar to Positive Peace. She recorded her seven wins from only 13 lifetime starts for Sydney trainer John O’Shea and four of the wins came in a row with the last win coming in the Listed Aspiration Stakes at Warwick Farm when she defeated the Queensland Oaks winner Miss Keepsake. Warpath’s last race was in the Group One Coolmore Stakes and it seems that race is also on the programme of Positive Peace. At stud Warpath has produced Alkashef (stakes placed), Gracious Grey (2 wins), Waruna (4 wins), Positive Peace (8 wins) and Rotator (stakes placed winner). The grey Not A Single Doubt colt is named Calcareous and he’s in the early stages of pre-training before heading for a new preparation with Toby and Trent Edmonds at the Gold Coast. Meanwhile Warpath has a yearling filly by Your Song and is in foal to So You Think.
At stud Warpath has left four grey foals and the colour comes from Linamix, a French stallion who is her grandsire. Rumours of Gai Waterhouse’s retirement have been buried by an avalanche of Group One success. Gai has been absent from Sydney racing recently due to a medical procedure and that prompted speculation that the First Lady of Racing might be about to bow out. But the Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott stable has bounced back with a remarkable run of success that includes Group One victories on three consecutive Saturdays in Sydney. The run began with Con Te Partiro in the Coolmore Stakes before Farnan won the Golden Slipper and was completed by Shout The Bar in the Vinery Stakes. Shout The Bar’s Vinery win throws a light on the stable’s incredible ability to produce fit horses when the big races roll around. The Vinery Stakes was Shout The Bar’s fourth career start yet she led and kept finding to fend out the best three-year-old fillies in the land. A daughter of Not A Single Doubt, Shout the Bar had her first start in a Benchmark 58 for fillies and mares and she was heavily backed when scoring a dominant win over 1100 metres. She won a Benchmark 64 over the same distance before stepping to 1600 metres when beaten a nose in the Group Three Kembla Grange Classic. The Vinery saw her step to 2000 metres at her fourth start and the stable’s groundwork paid off with a tough win. It’s that ability to identify talent and then go after the big prizes that has been a hallmark of Gai’s glittering career. Interestingly Ontrack bought a Capitalist filly out of Urban Groove, a mare Gai Waterhouse trained, at the January Magic Millions Sale.
Urban Groove raced only three times before injury curtailed her career, but Gai had her pegged as a topliner very early. She won her maiden by panels at Kembla Grange then headed to town and won the Listed Reg Allen Stakes and at start three was fourth in the Group One Flight Stakes. It’s that ability to identify talent and go after the big races that sets Gai and Adrian at the top of the tree when it comes to trainers in Australia and they’ve got plenty more talent to showcase the stable over the rest of the Autumn carnival. Uncertainty swirls the world but Ontrack’s first yearling breakers have completed their education without an issue. The Flying Artie filly and a Nicconi colt purchased from the Magic Millions Gold Coast Sale last week finished their education with Greg Bennett and his Fenwick Farm team at Canungra and came through with flying colours. It’s business as usual for the Ontrack horses and these yearlings are the first to complete their breaking and our other yearling purchases will follow in the weeks and months ahead. Ontrack’s policy is to allow all its yearling purchases a nice break in the paddock once they come from the sale and then send them to the breaker once they’ve chilled out following their sales preparation. Fortunately the South East Queensland weather has co-operated and the January and March Magic Millions yearlings have been able to spell in pastures that have enjoyed great summer rain. The Flying Artie-West Coast Chick filly was one of several Flying Artie yearlings Greg Bennett has broken in at Fenwick Farm and he’s impressed with the freshman stallion. “The Ontrack filly is a natural and like all the Flying Artie yearlings we have handled, she is a quick learner with a great attitude.
“On what we have seen this summer, Flying Artie is doing a great job,” said Greg Bennett. The NIcconi-Rock Style colt also had no issues during a straightforward education. |
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