Calamari Ring proves to be a tasty buy for To
After a wet and wild day at Flemington, owner Leo To will be hoping lightning has struck twice following the Inglis Banner (RL, 1000m) success of his two-year-old filly Calamari Ring (Street Boss).
Four years ago, the Sydney-based expat Hong Kong businessman ventured to the Inglis Australian Weanling Sale in the early days of building his Australian thoroughbred interests, and picked up a bargain filly by Brave Smash (Tosen Phantom) for $21,000.
She became Kimochi, who earned $2.12 million in a Group 1 winning career for Gary Portelli, being sold along the way to Yulong for $2.2m at the Inglis Chairman’s Sale.
To plundered another Inglis weanling auction – last year’s Great Southern sale – to purchase Calamari Ring, and while he had to stretch a little further to acquire her for $140,000, in partnership with agent Shane McGrath, the move looks set to pay off again.
Ridden by Ethan Brown, the Ciaron Maher-trained filly showed great maturity to head up the centre of the Flemington straight in driving rain and lead in ten male and female rivals by 0.2 lengths on debut in the Banner – comfortably eclipsing her purchase price in one hit with the $240,000 first prize.
“I’m a big fan of the Inglis weanling sales,” To said.
“As with my approach before, I always find there is great value at the weanling sales, so we didn’t have any hesitation about securing her.
“The money we pay at weanling sales is much better value than at the yearling sales. If she was at the yearling sales, I’d probably have had to pay $300,000 or $400,000 for her. So, it’s beautiful.
“I’ll continue to buy at the weanling sales. They’re my favourite.”
Calamari Ring was one of the first horses bought in To’s association with McGrath.
“She had beautiful size, she was very strong and very correct – just the best horse in the sale,” To said. “Shane has a very good eye, and he picked her for me.”
Maher was delighted with the filly’s debut performance, tipping she had “a bright future”.
“God I thought she’s done a great job,” the winning trainer told Racing.com. “She came up the middle of the track, had never seen the straight.
“She’s always shown ability. I didn’t think she’d get to the races this early, but as good horses do, they do well in training, and every time we’ve asked a little bit of her it brought her on.”
Calamari Ring lined up off the back of two jump-outs, the latest a victory at Cranbourne on October 20 as the only two-year-old against ten older males and females.
“Ciaron thought enough of her to trial against three-year-olds and she held her own in what looked wet enough ground,” Brown said.
“I was always confident she was going to handle it today. She’s just prepared so well.
“She was very professional and made my job easy, for a young horse. She’s nice and fit for a heavy track first up, and you can’t kick your career off in much better fashion than that.
“I did have a look at the track and I thought anywhere up the middle was fine. Once she let down, she let down nice.”
Bred and sold by Victoria’s Two Bays Farm, Calamari Ring is the fourth foal – all fillies – out of Excelsior Island (Exceed And Excel), a two-time winner in New Zealand and half-sister to that country’s Champion 2YO of 2011-12, Warhorse (General Nediym).
Excelsior Island now has a fifth filly foal, by Rubick (Encosta De Lago), and was covered last season by Dirty Work (Written Tycoon).
Street Boss (Street Cry) now has 84 stakes winners from 1,477 runners worldwide at 5.7 per cent. In Australia, Darley Victoria’s $66,000 stallion has 29 black type victors from 561 runners 5.2 per cent.
The Banner brought a quinella for fillies bought in tandem with McGrath, with second place going to Streisand (Magnus) at $6.50.
Her trainer Clinton McDonald and McGrath paid $100,000 for the daughter of Magnus (Flying Spur) from Northmore Thoroughbreds’ draft at this year’s Inglis Premier Yearling Sale in Melbourne.
Third went to $7 chance Bohemian Rhapsody (Prague) from the Melbourne Cup (Gr 1, 3200m)-winning stable of Tony and Calvin McEvoy, at $7.