Viddora’s fairytale ride

THESE are the girls trying to claim a slice of turf history at Morphettville today.

South Australian sprint queen Viddora and her partowner Jennifer Bowditch, strapper Zenna Zilm and Mel Kennewell, wife of trainer Lloyd Kennewell, will be shooting for a third $1 million win in the space of six months in the Group 1 Sangster Stakes (1200m).

Bowditch best sums up the group’s ride with the locally bred mare, plucked from the Adelaide Magic Millions Yearling Sale for just $40,000.

“Honestly, it’s unbelievable. It’s been a fairytale ride,’’ Bowditch said.

“I’ve been in racing my whole life with my family. Mum and Dad owned horses and getting a city winner in Brisbane was a big thing.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would own a horse this good.

“It’s normally everyone else that owns Group 1 horses.’’

The close bond within the Viddora team gets even stronger with Bowditch, who is married to the mare’s jockey, Joe Bowditch.

Jennifer Bowditch also lays claim to coming up with the name, though it didn’t quite pan out how she had originally planned.

“I actually spelt her name wrong,’’ she said with a laugh. “It was meant to be ‘Vidorra’, which in Spanish translates to ‘good life, easy life’. Lloyd still gives me a hard time about it.

“The best thing about Viddora is the owners. We’re now all mates and we’re from all walks of life. There are no billionaire tycoons who own a lot of the good horses, just normal people and we love travelling around together watching her.”

Viddora stamped herself as one of Australia’s best sprinting mares after two luckless Melbourne runs during the spring. That bad luck turned full circle when she travelled to Perth to win the Group 1 Winterbottom Stakes at Ascot in December before heading to the Gold Coast in January when she won the $1 million Magic Millions Sprint.