Ivy looks to continue Rosemont’s winning run in Merson Cooper
Rosemont Stud will look to unveil their next promising homebred juvenile on Saturday when the Jason Warren-trained Ivy (Hanseatic) steps out for the first time in the Merson Cooper Stakes (Listed, 1000m) at Caulfield, a race that has become a meaningful touchstone for the farm.
The filly arrives with strong pre-race credentials, having won all three of her trials, and shapes as a promising early-season prospect. Rosemont’s 2024 Merson Cooper winner Palm Angel (Starspangledbanner) also graduated from Jason Warren’s stable, later progressing to a Blue Diamond campaign highlighted by victory in the Blue Diamond Prelude (F) (Gr 3, 1100m).
Ivy also follows the path of her sire, Rosemont’s second-season stallion Hanseatic (Street Boss), who produced a brilliant winning performance in the Godolphin blue when the race was held at Sandown in 2019.
“We branded him the Rancher of his generation, because I think it was only Rancher that won the Merson Cooper, the Blue Diamond Preview, Prelude, and then won the Blue Diamond and Hanseatic fell just half a head short of completing that,” Rosemont Stud principal Anthony Mithen told ANZ News.
“It’s a race that has got our fingerprints all over it with Hanseatic winning it. We won it last year with Palm Angel, and hopefully Ivy can put her best foot forward on Saturday.”
Like Palm Angel, Ivy heads into her debut unbeaten in her preparatory work.
“It’s amazing how history tends to repeat, and this filly has just kept taking herself there,” Mithen said. “It certainly hasn’t been Jason or the team at Rosemont pushing her. I don’t think she’s lost a jump-out or a trial at this point in time, so hopefully she can keep that record intact come Saturday.”
With Harry Coffey to ride, she also has an opportunity to deliver Hanseatic his first stakes winner.
“Jason and I have been on and off the phone for the last week or so, and he’s like, ‘Well, I’ll throw in a nomination for the Merson Cooper,’ and then it was like, ‘Well, the noms look inviting’. And then it was like, ‘Well, let’s get a barrier and accept’,” Mithen said.
“She’s drawn one and she’s continued to eat, and she’s put herself in the race, so it’d be great for not only the mare, Independent Woman, who’s a mare that we bred and raced, but obviously Hanseatic to have a nice one out there. He’s got some handy winners and is doing a good job, but he probably could do with a stakes horse flying the flag for him and maybe this is her.”
A strong showing may prompt Ivy to follow Palm Angel’s path toward the autumn.
“Jason has reminded me that I haven’t nominated her for the Blue Diamond. So, that might have been just a little oversight. We trimmed back on our nominations for those long range races and felt we might cop our medicine and pay late entry fees if something surprises us. We nominated a handful for Blue Diamonds and Slippers, but just took a different tactic this year and it might bite me on the bum first go round. But let’s hope that’s a problem I’m discussing with Jason in the new year.”
Rosemont will also keep close watch on Tears Of Happiness (Pierro), a Clinton McDonald-trained filly they bred and sold to Yulong for $60,000 at the 2025 Inglis Premier Yearling Sale.
“Yulong seem to have had a bit of luck buying from us, which is bittersweet, because we do race a few horses ourselves,” Mithen said. “Matt Laurie bought Vinrock, but they’ve enjoyed the benefits of Vinrock being a Rosemont-bred and being offered at sale. Tears Of Happiness, who, for all intents and purposes, looked like a filly that was going to be a three-year-old classic sort of a filly, or a Guineas and Oaks sort of filly. So for her to be up and humming this early is a promising sign for that filly and for Yulong to go forward with.
“It’s great us fellow Victorian breeders can be swapping stock around and having good success.”
On the Caulfield card, Warren will also saddle Ivy’s half-brother Chicago Blues (Blue Point) in the Blue Sapphire Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m), continuing his long association with the farm.
“Jason Warren’s been such a great supporter of ours and been on our journey for quite a long time, and it’s ironic that he’s the guy that has probably done the best with a stallion dear to our heart in Starspangledbanner, racing fillies like Brooklyn Hustle and Palm Angel and it’d be quite fitting if he was the one to start to climb up the mountain for Hanseatic and get his first stakes winner.”
Chicago Blues, tackling 1200 metres for the first time, comes off a last-start third and will be ridden by Ethan Brown from barrier ten.
“It’s a family that is on the march, and he bought Chicago Blues off us. Often when trainers are mates and you’ve done a lot of business, you know what they’re up to at a sale. But I remember looking around going, ‘who bought that?’ And it was Jason Warren. He just liked the horse, and supported our product and put his hand up and his head on the chopping block and he’s got a nice horse from it.”
Hanseatic continues to build momentum, with fifteen winners already on the board from 46 runners.
“Every trainer I run into wants to pull on my coat, give me a nod and a wink and tell me, ‘Hey, you’ll be right with Hanseatic. I’ve got a good one,’” Mithen said.
“We’re an impatient lot, us breeders and those that follow the bloodlines and are trying to make a stallion. Sometimes you have to wait for all that to happen, and I’m definitely finding that we’re sick of the waiting and we’d like to see it, but it’s still promising that even as recently as this week, I had a trainer tell me that ‘I’ve got one there. You’re gonna be alright with Hanseatic, and I’m happy to turn up and buy them.’
“There’s enough of those stories out there to have me think that the slow burn is going to explode into a full-blown barbeque at some stage.”
Rosemont’s stallion roster expanded this year with the additions of Henry Longfellow (Dubawi), who shuttled from Coolmore Ireland, and Group 1-winning sprinter Schwarz (Zoustar), who was raced by the farm.
“He was really good. He’s covered around 130 mares,” Mithen said of Henry Longfellow.
“I think he took a little bit of time to adjust to the Southern Hemisphere in terms of his fertility, but once he settled in, he’s going to end up at 75-80 per cent fertility rate, which is going to get him over 100 live foals. We had really good support from good breeders, sending good mares, recognising the depth of pedigree and just the unique offering that he is.”
Schwarz also made an early impression.
“Schwarz was a dream to do anything with, he has been excellent. I think in my early days, we put a post on social media explaining that he had 14 pregnancies from his first ten mares checked, which had everyone scratching their head. He had four sets of twins out of the first ten mares that he tested.”
“He is a very fertile stallion, very good at his job and has thankfully retained his gentlemanly ways, he was such a dude as a race horse and has such a great temperament. The worry is, when you show the inside of the covering shed and what it’s used for, their temperament can change, but thankfully he is very fertile, very masculine when he’s in the barn, but he’s a sweetheart when he leaves the covering shed.
“If he throws that temperament into his stock and his good looks, the sky’s the limit for him.”
Despite the challenge of welcoming two new stallions to the roster, Mithen believes it was a successful exercise.
“Having two new stallions was a bit of a challenge and was something that we haven’t done before. I am proud of the team, the way they managed it and the business that it brings for your organisation and the extra yards that people have to go to, to make it all run smoothly.
“It was a proud Rosemont moment that we’ve ticked that box and said, well, we’ve got the structures in place. We’ve got the people in place and we can successfully launch the Southern Hemisphere careers of two prominent stallions.”
At Tuesday’s Warwick Farm trials, Rosemont also unveiled an exciting new colt in Peyton (Zoustar) who won over 790 metres. The added layer was Lafite (Zoustar), a brother to Schwarz, who finished third.
“The family and relatives of Schwarz keep coming back to remind us of Schwarz’s brilliance, I suppose, because I think a couple of yearlings that followed and brothers to Schwarz have made more than Schwartz made, but he’s the one with the runs on the board,” Mithen said.
“Peyton looks like a nice horse for the future. We’ve put him away now after that educational preparation and being a son of Zoustar, they’re always better after Christmas, so we’ll target the autumn and hopefully the pointy end of the two-year-old Autumn racing with him. He is a very talented colt that we offered at Magic Millions, but people found reasons not to bid on him, so we’re the lucky recipient of a very smart colt that looks like he’ll be pretty good for us.”
With the breeding season now winding down, attention is turning toward next year’s edition of the Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale.
“Our Magic Millions graduates from the 2025 sale have gone particularly well, from a small sample range, Tornado Valley winning the Maibynong and One Day At A Time, a Bivouac who is stakes-placed for Tony and Calvin McEvoy. So we’re up and running with those two-year-olds and looking forward to getting back up there in six weeks’ time and doing it all again and presenting another strong draft of two-year-old types.”