Inglewood’s reputation enhanced by Karaka Million double-hander
The reputation of New Zealand’s South Island is for breeding stout stayers more attuned to Derbies and cups, but tomorrow’s Karaka 2YO Million (RL, 1200m) can prove that’s not the case.
South Island breeder Gus Wigley has two runners in the NZ$1 million two-year-old feature at Ellerslie’s twilight card – a meeting already sold out – proving that Inglewood Stud and the region can produce two-year-olds.
The Stephen Marsh-trained Velocious (Written Tycoon), a NZ$190,000 purchase by Go Racing, has won two of her three starts, while the Inglewood-sold Mike Moroney and Pam Gerard-trained Force Of Law (War Decree) also lines up in the Karaka Million after three race starts.
Velocious, a daughter of two-year-old winner Parmalove (Snitzel), is $3.20 favourite on the back of two wins and a last-start third in the Eclipse Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m), a race won by Te Akau’s Belatrix Star (Star Witness).
Force Of Law ($67), a NZ$50,000 purchase by his trainers who is by Inglewood’s resident sire, has also had three starts, his most recent a fifth in the Eclipse.
“Velocious has been a really good advert for the farm so far. We bought the mother to try and breed something that could run early and she’s left three that have run early so far, so hopefully she can put in a good performance,” Wigley told ANZ Bloodstock News.
“We’ve also got another runner in the race, a War Decree that we sold. He’s with the Ballymore stables and it’d be nice if they can both put on a good show for us.”
Wigley reasoned that the small number of studs in the South Island were capable of breeding early-going two-year-olds if they invested in the right mares.
“Canterbury is just a great place to grow things and one of the best producers of grass in the world, so there’s no reason at all why we can’t be producing two-year-olds down there,” he said.
“You’ve just got to go out and do it, so we bought a couple of nice Australian early speed mares and we’re also quite happy to send mares across the Tasman to get a bit of a precocity into our draft, so there’s no reason why we can’t breed a good two-year-old from down there [in the South Island].”
Velocious’ half-sister by Dundeel (High Chaparral) will be offered by Inglewood Stud as Lot 295 on Monday, which is again a result of Wigley’s willingness to send mares across the Tasman to ensure some diversity in Inglewood’s Karaka draft.
“When we first started out there was a flight directly from Christchurch to Sydney and we used that quite a lot,” he said.
“It was faster to get a mare to the Hunter Valley than it was for us to the Waikato. It’s two days on a float to the Waikato.
“Unfortunately, that flight got cancelled after Covid, so we have to go through Auckland now, but we’ve done quite well out of sending those mares to Australia as well as to the North Island to have a nice diverse draft at Karaka.
“We sent ten mares to Australia in [2023] and five or six last year. There’s certainly some nice options in the Waikato this year, so we kept a few more back home.”
More immediately, Inglewood has 12 horses in Book 1 and three in Book 2.
Wigley said: “The first day, Tuesday, we had more parades than we’ve ever done before and I’ve been bringing yearlings up here for 12 years now.
“We don’t do the on-farm parades at home, so I think a lot of people were doing the whole catalogue and ticking off the South Island drafts, but it’s an encouraging start anyway.
“It’s the usual people you see, but they’re all here and look fairly enthusiastic, so hopefully that translates into a good sale.”