Weekly spotlight on breeding

Breeding authority Peter Wharton presents all the harness racing news on breeding from Australia, New Zealand and North America every week brought to you by Garrard’s Horse & Hound.

Cups double to Major Meister 

Major Meister, a son of the American sire Art Major, has been the star of the Country Cups racing in Victoria. 

He won the $100,000 Cranbourne Pacing Cup from the front end and then came from absolute last to annex the $75,000 Garrard’s Bendigo Pacing Cup, beating Sicario and the Victoria Cup winner Max Delight. 

Major Meister is closely related to last year’s NSW Oaks winner Just Hope, who won 10 races and $340,267 in stakes. 

Major Meister is by Art Major from Lite Jagermeister (1:56.3), by In The Pocket from Lite Jade, by Holmes Hanover from Jessica MacFaber, by El Patron and tracing to the taproot Miss Kate. 

Lite Jagermeister, a thrice Melton winner, produced others in Don’t Tell Tom (1:57.3) and last season’s NZ three-year-old winner He’s A Meister. 

Others from this family have been the Australian Group 1 winners Speak No Evil, Musical Delight, Queen Of Pop and Ripp, Beach Music (Vic. Youthful) and the NZ Leonard Memorial winner Top Tempo. 

Major Meister was bred by prominent Southland horseman Tom Kilkelly, who part-owns him. 

WA Pacing Cup prospect 

One of the stronger WA Pacing Cup candidates is the seven-year-old Diego (Bettor’s Delight), who has proved himself in the top flight and has won his way back to an NR 120 mark. 

His latest winning run in the $100,000 J. P. Stratton Cup at Gloucester Park was a fine performance. He led from the pole and clocked his final three quarters in 28.4, 27.9 and 28.5 for a 1:54.6 mile rating over 2130 metres. 

DIEGO REPLAY

A tough customer, Diego is a gelding by Bettor’s Delight from Sakura, dam also of useful winners in The Bachelor 1:52 ($110,448) and Mister Bushido 1:55.4 ($185,186). Sakura was sired by Christian Cullen (champion son of In The Pocket) from Mika, by What’s Next from Wakana, by Soky’s Atom from the Lordship mare Deidre Ann. 

This family has produced horses the calibre of My Field Marshal 1:46.9 (NSW Miracle Mile), the dual Oaks winner Foreal, Askmenow (WA Oaks heat), Madiba Magic, Im Rocknroll Magic (1:51.1) and the Bendigo Cup winner Regal Dash. 

Expensive Ego star sprinter 

Expensive Ego (Rock N Roll Heaven) advanced strong claims to being the best sprint pacer in the country today when he scored an emphatic win in 1:49.2 at Menangle last Saturday. 

It was his fourth sub 1:50 success. He set his lifetime mark of 1:48.6 as a four-year-old at the Sydney headquarters’ track. 

EXPENSIVE EGO REPLAY

Expensive Ego has not done a great deal of racing, having averaged 10 starts a season. In four seasons of racing Expensive Ego has won 24 races – including four Group 1’s – and has been nine times placed from 43 starts for $883,517. 

By the Rocknroll Hanover horse Rock N Roll Heaven, he is out of Art Start (1:58.2), by Perfect Art (son of Artsplace) from Sweet Clementine, by Land Grant from Sue Adios, by Jerry Adios. Expensive Ego is a half-brother to the QBred Triad 2YO winner Art’s Treasure 1:50.9 ($152,542), Group 2 winner Diamond Shooz, Bohdi Tree 1:52.1 ($192,854) and Golightly (1:54.5). 

Hobart Pacing Cup winner 

He’s Ideal (American Ideal), who won the $40,000 Hobart Pacing Cup, main race on the opening night at Elwick, is an American Ideal gelding from the same family as that which produced the top Victorian pacers Ride High and Safe And Sound. 

He’s Ideal, who was a Group 3 winner at Melton last year, has only been only sparingly raced but he has shown up as a very useful pacer, and it was a strong field he beat at Hobart. 

Bred by Peter Gleeson and Bruce and Craig Cameron, he is out of the Grinfromeartoear mare Punch Line (1:54.2), a half-sister to a fine racemare in Lovelist 1:53.2 ($222,889), being out of Lifeline, by Classic Garry from the Windshield Wiper mare Larrakeyah Lady, whose family today is one of the best in the Australian stud book. 

It includes Group 1 winners in Ride High (1:49), Rocknroll Magic, Treachery, Beauty Secret, Major Secret, Out To Play, Safe And Sound, The Good Times, Perfect Major and many others. 

Whiskey Cavalier is good 

One of the most capable young pacers racing in Victoria at present is Whiskey Cavalier (Lincoln Royal), who is quickly working his way through the classes. He has won three of his five starts since being imported from NZ. 

Whiskey Cavalier has a wealth of blood to back up his claims to further promotion, being a five-year-old gelding by Lincoln Royal from a fine racemare in Special Ops (1:59.2), by Armbro Operative from Middle Legacy, by Silk Legacy. 

Special Ops, the dam of Whiskey Cavalier, won 12 races and $276,049 in stakes and at the stud left winners in the exported Bettor Ops 1:50 ($198,234) and The Charging Moa 1:51 ($348,733) and others in The Optimist (1:58.3) and Black Ops (1:59.5). 

Besides Special Ops, Middle Legacy, a winner of five races, left Canterbury Cam, a winner in 1:53.2 in America, the Adelaide victor Cam But Try (1:59.1) and the Cam’s Trickster mare Cam’s Legacy, dam of the Menangle winner Cam Before The Storm 1:53.1 ($122,141), Sir Cullen (1:59) and the exported Man With The Money 1:52.8 ($186,933) and grand-dam of the prolific Albion Park winner Wattlebank Flyer 1:54.9 ($157,731). 

Miss Limelight sold 

Miss Limelight (Bettor’s Delight), one of Western Australia’s top racemares, has been sold to America, and was expected to leave earlier this week. 

The Bettor’s Delight mare was bred by Woodlands Stud and bought by Perth businessman Albert Walmsley as a yearling. She was trained by Michael Brennan and Ryan Bell and won her way through to the best classes. One of her best efforts was her success in the Group 1 $150,000 Westral Mares Classic at Gloucester Park last November, beating a top field including Eighteen Carat and American Arma. 

Miss Limelight started 55 times in WA for 15 wins and 12 placings and $235,240 in stakes. 

Yearling Sale dates announced 

The dates for the 2023 round of yearling sales in Australia have been announced. 

Australian Pacing Gold will conduct sales at the Gold Coast on January 22 and Perth’s Swan Valley on March 5. 

Nutrien Equine will stage yearling sales at four different venues – Sydney (March 4 and 5), Gold Coast (March 12), Bathurst (March 19) and Melbourne (April 2 and 3). The entry totals 760 yearlings and breeders from Perth to Brisbane represented. 

The Tasmanian Harness Yearling Sale will be held at Carrick on March 12, while the Silver Salver SA Yearling Sale is scheduled for March 26. 

The Garrard’s Redcliffe Yearling Sale will close off proceedings on April 2. 

Half-sister to Smolda 

Tizzy Lizzie, a Rock N Roll Heaven half-sister to the Inter Dominion champion Smolda, broke maiden ranks at Yarra Valley last Monday. 

The three-year-old had been placed in three of her previous nine starts. 

Bred by Paul Blackshaw, Tizzy Lizzie is out of the Safely Kept mare Under The Mattress (1:58), whose dam, Lotsa Wealth, left eight winners including the Tasmanian Derby winner Ginger Bliss 1:53.7 ($191,917). 

New trotting book 

Noted Melbourne historian John Peck has just released a new book titled Melbourne Racing Venues. 

The 480 page tome provides an in-depth summary of racing in 167 suburbs/towns within 50 kilometres of the Melbourne CBD, covering over 350 racing venues, 24 trialling tracks and 17 proposed tracks that were never built. 

There’s narrative and photos of events for trotters, pacers, gallopers, steeplechasers, greyhounds and even fox terriers, goats, draught horses and donkeys. 

Melbourne Racing Venues is profusely illustrated with many rare photographs including the only surviving photo of the first Melbourne Cup winner Archer as well photos of champion pacers and trotters, horsemen and officials dating back more than a century. 

The chronicle section lists the trainers and drivers of every Group 1 winner in Australian harness racing from 1987 to 2001, multiple Group 1 winning horses, Australian and New Zealand Group winners in the northern hemisphere and Australian Group 1 winning trainers and drivers in NZ and Melbourne training and driving premiership winners. 

Melbourne Racing Venues can be accessed from February 1 at the National Library (Canberra), Victorian State Library, Royal Historical Society (Melbourne), Prahran Mechanics Institute, Harness Racing Museum (Bendigo) and Racing Museum (Flemington). 

by Peter Wharton, for Harnesslink