Broodmare producing many winners
produced victory in the Gr. 1 Windsor Park Plate at the Hawke’s Bay spring carnival when he added the Gr. 3 Manawatu Challenge Stakes.
That win continued the form of co-trainers Lance O’Sullivan and Andrew Scott, who maintained their run through the holiday period to be on 25 wins and seventh place on the national premiership, just one win behind Matamata’s leading trainer Jason Bridgman, after the first week of the New Year.
Jason’s biggest day of the holiday period came at Rotorua on December 27 when he saddled up a hattrick, only to be denied making it four by his former senior training partner Graham Richardson.
The day before, Matamata’s sole winner on the opening day of the Ellerslie carnival came compliments of the Mark Lupton-trained Close Up, scoring his third win from his last four starts.
Lance Noble headed the Matamata innings at Taupo on December 30, winning the Taupo Cup with Rose of Virginia, while Ken and Bev Kelso produced an impressive winner in Perfect Fit, Jason Bridgman added another with the O’Reilly filly Is This Love, and Wayne Hillis provided an upset winner in the form of the Jim Marks-owned Le’vantos.
The New Year dawned promising plenty for owners Paul and Shirlie Ryan with their pair In Style, trained by Danica Guy, and Surpass (Mike Moroney and Chad Ormsby) the form runners for the Ellerslie headlines races, the $200,000 Railway Stakes and City of Auckland Cup.
After much cheering, barracking and glass-titling from their band of merry supporters, the Waharoa couple completed a nearperfect day as In Style took the Railway in a cliffhanger finish from another local, Whosyourmaster, and one race later Surpass went down by inches.
In Style’s Group One win was a great result, capping as it did a hat-trick of summer sprint wins and bringing the ultimate reward to her ownerbreeders, who have invested heavily over the years, and to Danica Guy, who has put together an admirable record with her small but select racing string.
We could spare a thought for another local farming couple, Dan and Judy Moss, who for the second time had to endure being nosed out of victory in the north’s premier sprint race. Back in 2001 O’Mallys Boy went down in a photo and again when having to settle for second in the Gr. 1 Easter Handicap back at the same track three months later.
The weights will be in favour of Whosyourmaster when he and In Style clash again in the $250,000 Telegraph at Trentham this Saturday. Danica will have a powerful two-pronged assault on that race,with her other star sprinter Tomorrowland also racing.
Another in the mix is the Ken and Bev Kelso-trained Fix, fresh from a run of placed form heading into Christmas and a worthy replacement for stablemate Bounding, who was unable to defend her 2014 Railway Stakes crown due to a hoof problem.
Matamata will also have a powerful contingent on hand for the final day of the Trentham carnival, with the Moroney-Ormsby stable having as many as three – last year’s winner Graphic along with Surpass and The Fire Inside – lining up in the Wellington Cup.
The Hillis stable may also have multiple representation in the form of Thames Cup winner Nothing Trivial and Perfect Start, while Pure Champion and Puccini are scheduled to run in the Thorndon Mile.
The old year ended on a sad note with the sudden death on New Year’s Eve of Waikato Stud’s champion home-bred O’Reilly at 21.
O’Reilly was a champion in every sphere, first as an outstanding galloper with two Group One wins from a tragically shortened racing career with Dave and Paul O’Sullivan, and then as a stallion. At the time of his death from a suspected heart attack, he had sired more than 700 winners – 77 of them at stakes level and 12 of them Group One – for stakes verging on $100 million.
His raft of stallion premierships include four in New Zealand, three New Zealand and Australia combined, two for global earnings by a New Zealandbased sire and one Hong Kong title.
With 38 stakes winners already having been produced by his daughters, O’Reilly is also destined for greatness as a broodmare sire, while his yearlings, foals and those to be born from his 2014 matings will also ensure his name as one of our very best stallions will live for many years.