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Third Magic Millions 2YO Classic triumph for Maher as Unit Five makes history on the Gold Coast
Trevor Marshallsea
ANZ News
Ciaron Maher once again proved himself an exceptional trainer of juveniles when exciting colt Unit Five, a son of Widden Stud sire Supido (Sebring), claimed Saturday’s Magic Millions 2YO Classic (RL, 1200m) at the Gold Coast, becoming the first horse to land the race on only his second start.
Bought by Maher for a mere $80,000 at last year’s Gold Coast Yearling Sale, Unit Five went into the $3m scamper after only one previous race - a debut 2.5-length win in Caulfield’s Magic Millions 2YO Classic (1100m) on December 20.
Such a light preparation was unprecedented for a winner of the Gold Coast’s two-year-old highlight but Unit Five - who won a tune-up barrier trial at the Gold Coast 12 days before Saturday - validated Maher’s judgment in emphatic style.
Unit Five was expertly ridden by renaissance jockey Thomas Stockdale, jumping from gate seven in a field reduced to 13 by three scratchings - including the race morning vet-enforced withdrawal of favourite Warwoven (Sword Of State) due to lameness.
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Stockdale eased his mount back to settle fourth-last on the fence as an even tempo was set up front by Itchintogo (Sun City).
Entering the straight, Stockdale followed stablemate and $4.40 second favourite Tornado Valley (Too Darn Hot) and his rider Ethan Brown as they made a move two horses off the fence.
But when switched into ample room on the inside, Unit Five burst powerfully to the lead to have the race in his keeping at the 100m.
The bay sprinted home to score by 1.11 lengths as fellow colt Tornado Valley gave another glowing endorsement for the Maher touch by taking second.
The Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott team’s third-stringer from a three-horse contingent, filly By Choice (Written By), was 0.03 lengths further back in third at $11 ahead of $61 outsider Double Cool (Cool Aza Beel).
Tulloch Lodge’s other two runners Knightsbridge (Farnan) and Shiki (Too Darn Hot) were fifth and seventh at $11 and $6.50 respectively, while $3.30 favourite Zip Lock (Hellbent) split that pair.
It was an emotional Maher who spoke to the media after his third win in the Magic Millions 2YO Classic in seven editions, following the successes of Away Game (Snitzel) in 2020 and Coolangatta (Written Tycoon) in 2022.
While Tornado Valley was having his fourth start and Unit Five his second, mega trainer Maher agreed the key to individually training two-year-olds was “not giving them too much [work] but just enough”.
“That’s the trick. They’re not conditioned to racing much,” he said.
“Myself and the whole team were quite confident that Unit Five, after one start, we were going to bring him up, give him a look at the track, trial this way around, and go in fresh.
“You want them still improving rather than getting there and not being able to do it.
“I was pretty confident with both of our runners. I was leaning towards the other one, to be honest.”
Maher, who has 579 named horses on his books spread over nine locations - plus “a heap” more bought at the Magic Millions Yearling Sale in the past week - paid tribute to his staff and especially his brother Declan, who now trains his own small team at the Gold Coast and helped prepare Unit Five for Saturday.
“Brother Dec put a lot of work into Unit Five, to get him here, and present and race like that at his second start. I don’t think that’s ever been done before [in the Gold Coast 2YO Classic]. It’s awesome,” Maher said.
“I can say ‘I’ve done it again’, but when you’ve got a large business it all comes down to your staff
“I can say ‘I’ve done it again’, but when you’ve got a large business it all comes down to your staff. And Dec. Awesome.”
He added: “Tommy Stockdale is a little ripper. He does a lot of work for us. Tommy’s starting to get into a habit of winning big races.
“He and Browny [Ethan Brown, rider of the runner-up] are good, hard-working blokes with good ability. I like working with people like that.”
Stockdale said he was confident before the race despite Unit Five’s light lead-up, having ridden him in his Gold Coast trial.
“I thought this guy’s trial was something to be reckoned with, and I shut him down early because he was going to show them up too much and possibly do too much,” he said. “I couldn’t wait to get up here today and see him today.
“[In the race] I was on the back of the right horses and I had to pick which one was right to take me in.
“For a young horse to go back to the rail by themselves and then to put them away shows how mature he is, and he’s a two-year-old to be reckoned with in the autumn.”
The 26-year-old Stockdale, who’s yet to win beyond Group 3 level but took Pakenham’s $1m Supernova (1400m) on the Maher-trained Warnie (Highland Reel) last month, was also emotional after the victory, offering thanks to his wife Lily - who’s heavily pregnant with the couple’s first child - and to Maher for their support.
“The last month-and-a-half has just been unreal,” he said. “I sound like a broken record but Ciaron’s support has just changed my career.
“I’ve always wanted to be competing on the biggest stages and riding in the biggest races but my weight has held me back from that, but I’ve always stuck to my work.
“I don’t know if he [Maher] realises what his support means.”
He added: “My wife has seen the best of me and the worst of me through this game. With Ciaron’s support it’s only made me a better rider, and through the support of my wife, she’s just made me a better man. I can’t wait to get home and give her a hug.”
There is emotion, too, in the name of the colt.
Unit Five was bred by Widden’s stud manager Ben Walsh, nominations manager Matt Comerford, yearling manager Liam Attwood, financial manager Andrew Swales, and former team member Jarrod Robinson. The group bought the colt’s dam En Aval (Toorak Toff) via Magic Millions online for only $9,500 in 2021.
With his breeders staying in the ownership when Unit Five was sold out of Widden’s Gold Coast draft last year, the colt is named after long-serving Widden staff member David Merrick, who died last February, and whose callsign on the stud’s two-way radio system was “unit five”.
The result was a timely one for Supido. Unit Five is his third stakes winner after dual black-type victor Buenos Noches and Flemington Listed winner What You Need.
Supido has 97 winners from 150 runners and stood for $9,900 (inc GST) last spring, down from $16,500 (inc GST).
The win by Unit Five was the second winner on the Gold Coast card for a two-year-old out of a daughter of Toorak Toff (Show A Heart), after filly Toorak Jewel (Tassort), a daughter of Toorak Rose, took the $500,000 The Debut (1000m).
Unit Five is the second foal of En Aval, who won twice. The mare’s colt by Anders (Not A Single Doubt) will be offered as part of the Widden draft at the Inglis Premier Yearling Sale in March. The youngster is catalogued as Lot 34.
En Aval now has a filly foal by Exceedance (Exceed And Excel) and was covered by Schwarz (Zoustar) last spring.
Tigroni (Tiger Of Malay) finished ninth in the 2YO Classic but won the lion’s share of the Magic Millions Racing Women’s Bonus, banking $333,334 for her all-female ownership group.
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Torque To Be Sure survives protest in Magic Millions 3YO Guineas
Torque To Be Sure (Shamus Award) broke his maiden with a welcome feature race win for his Rosemont Stud sire in a dramatic victory in Saturday’s Magic Millions 3YO Guineas (RL, 1400m), surviving a protest to beat hot favourite Ninja (Farnan).
The race became an intriguing study between the Matt Dunn trained $13 shot Torque To Be Sure - who entered the contest winless after ten starts - and $1.60 hotpot Ninja, Michael Freedman’s burgeoning star who’d won three of five.
With Torque To Be Sure and Ben Melham starting from gate 15 of 17, and Ninja from the widest gate, the latter followed the former in a three-wide line just worse than midfield.
Torque To Be Sure took the lead at the 200 metres as Ninja came after him to his outside. Melham’s mount lurched outwards under pressure and impeded his rival’s progress, before shooting away to score by 0.76 lengths.
Ninja’s rider Tommy Berry fired in a protest and alleged the interference had cost him more than the winning margin. But chief steward Josh Adams said his panel found that while the level of interference was “significant”, they could not be satisfied it would have made the difference between winning and losing considering the margin.
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The protest drama cut the post-race comments from the winning trainer and jockey to a minimum. But Melham was able to report Torque To Be Sure had considerable ability, despite his maiden status before Saturday which came alongside five placings, four of them in city class.
"He's not an easy horse to ride," Melham said of the gelding, who was a 0.31-length second last Saturday in the Sunlight Consolation (1100m).
"He went off the track a little but he was pretty good today. I ended up in a sweet spot and the back-up really helped me over 1400 metres.
"He was pretty dominant. Not a bad effort for a maidener. The ability was never the issue, but it is good to see him break through in this race today.”
Thanking Torque To Be Sure’s owners for their patience, Dunn said starting him over 1100 metres eight days earlier had helped him settle for Saturday’s 1400-metre assignment.
“He’s been a frustration,” the Murwillumbah trainer said. “I’m lucky I’ve got a very patient owner's group in him. But when you look at what he did today, he’s certainly always had the talent.
“The sky’s the limit for him. Who knows what he can do.
“It was always the plan to go to the 1100 metres last week. Ben rode him perfectly today.”
Bought by Dunn and Neil Jenkinson for $260,000 from Attunga Stud’s draft at the Gold Coast in 2024, Torque To Be Sure mixed some handy unplaced runs with his placings en route to Saturday’s breakthrough.
At Brisbane’s winter carnival last year, he was fifth in the Sires’ Produce Stakes (Gr 2, 1400m) before running a fair eighth in the JJ Atkins (Gr 1, 1600m).
Dunn said his confidence pre-race was “pretty high” because he’d felt Torque To Be Sure should have finished closer than two lengths behind Ninja two starts back, when the pair ran third and sixth respectively in the the Magic Millions Pierata Plate (1200m) at Doomben behind another imposing three-year-old in Grafterburners (Graff).
Coincidentally, Dunn said his horse had been hampered that day by interference from Ninja.
Asked what it was like to win a $3m race, Dunn said it was “something else - especially when you’ve got a maiden going into it”.
Reflecting on a long week after he’d bought five horses at the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale, Dunn said he was preparing to celebrate in unusual fashion.
“I’m ready to go to sleep,” he said with a laugh. “It’s a long week for trainers. I’m feeling the pinch.”
Torque To Be Sure is the ninth foal of Elimbari (Fastnet Rock), who won one of her 13 starts, at Rosehill, and was Group 3-placed for trainer and co-breeder Kris Lees, who’s also a co-breeder for Torque To Be Sure.
Elibari also produced Vincere Volare (I Am Invincible) and Conscious (So You Think), who are Group 2 and Listed-placed respectively.
The family, descendant from Listed-winning second dam Shalt Not (St Covet), also includes stakes winners Amelia’s Dream (Redoute’s Choice) and About Time (American Pharoah), and the Group 1-placed Young Werther (Tavistock).
Torque To Be Sure is the third stakes winner this season for Shamus Award (Snitzel), who covered 94 mares last spring at Rosemont for $33,000 (inc GST), down from $38,500 (inc GST).
The 15-year-old, who coincidentally broke his maiden in the Cox Plate (Gr 1, 2040m), now has 31 stakes winners, including six at the elite-level, from 527 runners overall at 5.7 per cent, and 330 winners.
Torque To Be Sure is the latest foal for Elimbari entered in the stud book.
Crash The Party finished fourth in the Guineas and, in addition to $135,000 prize-money, picked up $162,500 as the first of the horses eligible for the Magic Millions Racing Women Bonus past the post.
Tassort’s Toorak Jewel shines in The Debut
Newgate Farm-based stallion Tassort (Brazen Beau) and young trainer Paul Shailer could have a ready-made star on their hands after Toorak Jewel showed up the boys in streaking away with Saturday’s The Debut 2YO Plate (1000m) at the Gold Coast.
In the 11-strong field of first starters, bargain buy Toorak Jewel was sent out a slightly easy $3 favourite after a scintillating 9.8-length win in her only barrier trial at the same track on December 30.
And, with champion jockey James McDonald securing the ride for her first start in Saturday’s $500,000 Debut, she emphatically lived up to that performance. Toorak Jewel was slightly wayward on jumping from gate two, but soon mustered to the lead, led by two lengths around the turn, exploded to a five-length margin at the 250 metres, and won easing up by 1.44 lengths.
The filly’s time of 56.31 was just 0.64 seconds outside the Gold Coast’s overall track record for the 1000 metres - a fair effort for a juvenile debutant filly eased up near the post - especially considering that track record has stood for 22 years and McDonald rode a kilo overweight at 56kg.
Bred by Queensland’s Lourdes Park Stud, Toorak Jewel was a $36,000 purchase from Book 2 of last year’s Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale for mega owner Mike Crooks, he of the “Mishani” squadron of runners.
She now looks destined to be a stable star for Shailer, who has some 62 horses on his books at his Gold Coast base, having spent 12 years with Chris Waller, including heading up the gargantuan trainer’s operation at the same track.
That tenure came to an end when Shailer paid the price for a party at Waller’s Gold Coast stable that infamously got out of hand in 2021, but he has been building his solo operation impressively in the past couple of years and, with Toorak Jewel showing abundant potential, his immediate future looks rosy.
Saturday’s victory will also be welcomed by the team behind Tassort, who stands at Newgate for $38,500 (inc GST) in a partnership with his owners, Emirates Park.
The nine-year-old stallion began with a bang in season 2023-24, with his first crop hatching two stakes winners including ATC Sires’ Produce Stakes (Gr 1, 1400m) queen Manaal and Group 2 victor Ameena.
While Tassort’s second crop has yet to provide him with a third black-type victor, he now appears to have another star filly to his name, as Shailer reflected post-race.
“He [McDonald] had to go early in the race to cross the horse that kicked up inside her. She sustained a strong gallop but when James asked her to quicken she responded really nicely and looked like a filly with a fair bit of talent,” Shailer said.
“Not going to get carried away as, obviously, they’re all first starters but certainly had respect for the race with Gai [Waterhouse] and Adrian [Bott] having runners.
“It is a big thrill. She has shown us a bit and it was good to get the job done.”
McDonald paid tribute to the filly - and his fellow expat New Zealander Shailer.
“Paul was always going to be a very good trainer,” he said. “It was special. That is a good indication on what he can do.
“For her to be so quiet but to jump and run like she does. If she can harness that a bit then they’re going to have a ball.”
Crooks said he’d been led to buy the filly out of his respect for Tassort.
“I love the sire and I was happy to take it at the last minute. It’s gone to Paul and he has done a great job,” said Crooks, who despite having made millions from his swimming pools business, still likes to operate at the bargain end of yearling sales.
“I always have a bit of a budget and it is really low,” he said with a laugh.
The Debut provided an all-female trifecta, with Waterhouse and Bott’s Lady Moscato (Home Affairs) - a daughter of dual Group winner Champagne Cuddles (Not A Single Doubt) - second at $6, and the Tony Gollan-trained Dolly Boom (Spirit Of Boom) third at $8.
In fact, the first male home was Chris Anderson’s gelding Tengun Tommy (Flying Artie) in sixth place at $11.
Toorak Jewel hails from humble origins, with her yearling sale page having room for five dams.
She’s the third living foal of Toorak Rose (Toorak Toff), a winner at two over 1100 metres whose dam Plans (Strategic) was twice stakes placed. Fifth dam Forina (Vibrant) won the fourth edition of the Blue Diamond Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) in 1974, and her Listed-winning daughter Biscarina (Biscay) was the dam of four-time elite winning sprinter Schillaci (Salieri).
The last entry in the stud book for Toorak Rose comes through the birth of her filly by The Odyssey (Better Than Ready) in 2024.
Poster Girl brings up the Magic Millions double
A switch back to shorter trips has led to a bumper summer for Poster Girl (Alabama Express), the Chris and Corey Munce-trained mare who claimed her second feature in eight days at the Gold Coast on Saturday.
After taking last weekend’s $250,000 Rising Stars 3YO & 4YO feature over 1300 metres for fillies and mares by 0.45 lengths, Poster Girl backed up on Saturday to scramble home in the $1m Magic Millions Fillies & Mares over the same trip.
Backed late to start at $7.50, Poster Girl was impressive in doing it the hard way in what developed into a two-horse war from a long way out.
She crossed from gate 12 of 18 for Martin Harley to sit outside the leader, the Lucy Yeomans trained $4.80 favourite Jenni The Fox (Too Darn Hot), who had the advantage of barrier two.
The pair were in front on settling and were able to dictate a moderate pace. Let loose on straightening, they then fought an epic battle down the straight. Jenni The Fox looked beaten at the 200m but fought back tenaciously on the inside to force Poster Girl to dig deep as the two hit the line locked together, with Poster Girl prevailing by 0.02 lengths.
The John O’Shea and Tom Charlton-trained Countyourblessings (I Am Invincible) had loomed on the first pair’s inside near home but had to settle for third, 0.15 off the leader, at $21.
Group-placed via her second in Storm Boy’s (Justify) BJ McLachlan Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) in 2023, Poster Girl has now won six of her 17 starts and four of her past five - two over 1200 metres and two over 1300 metres.
A $160,000 Magic Millions Gold Coast purchase for senior owner Gerard O’Toole and Arthur Hoyeau, Poster Girl has added $718,000 to her coffers in the past eight days, her earnings having soared past $1.3m.
The four-year-old’s career surge has come after her father-son training team was moved to rethink her distance targets, following an ignominious end to her last campaign with a ninth in Doomben’s The Roses (Gr 2, 2000m) and a 14th in the Queensland Oaks (Gr 1, 2200m).
“Gee she was tough. She fought back and she was a sitting duck there for a while but she’s done nothing but improve this preparation. She is best kept fresh over the shorter trips,” Corey Munce said.
“The way the race was going to work out, we probably needed to be closer today from the draw. I didn’t expect him to be outside the lead but he [Harley] had a pretty nice time there.”
Chris Munce added: “The thing about this mare is that we tried to train her as a stayer last time and I think she runs a strong mile but I think she got hampered by wet tracks which she hates. A firm track like today suits her.”
Harley was equally impressed with Poster Girl’s fight, especially having raced on successive Saturdays.
“I wasn’t sure if I held on or not,” he said. “With the week back-up, she’s got the heart of a lion and she got up when it mattered.”
Bred by Yulong and sold through their draft at Magic Millions Gold Coast in 2023, Poster Girl is the fifth foal of the unraced American-bred mare Caricature (Dubawi).
Her second dam, Brattothecore (Katahaula County), was a dual Listed winner and dam of another two-time stakes victor in City Style (City Zip), who won a Group 3 in England, a Listed in the US, and was thrice Group 1-placed in Dubai.
Caricature now has a colt by Grunt (O'Reilly) who is entered for the Inglis Premier Yearling Sale in March (Lot 544), a foal sister to Poster Girl, and was covered by Yulong’s new sire Growing Empire (Zoustar) in November.
Alabama Express (Redoute’s Choice), the nine-year-old who stood at Yulong for $66,000 last spring, up from $55,000 (inc GST), has four stakes winners from 116 runners, and 63 winners overall.
