Lofty targets on Sheza Alibi’s agenda
Peter Moody declared he had a very special filly on his hands – one with the Cox Plate (Gr 1, 2040m) potentially on her horizon – after Sheza Alibi (Saxon Warrior) made a successful return with her third stakes win on Saturday at Caulfield.
The outlier Australian performer – and only stakes winner in this country – for former Coolmore Stud shuttler Saxon Warrior (Deep Impact), Sheza Alibi made it five victories from eight starts with a breathtaking display in the Angus Armanasco Stakes (Gr 2, 1400m) for three-year-old fillies at Caulfield.
After taking Flemington’s The Vanity (Gr 3, 1400m) and the Sandown Guineas (Gr 2, 1600m) back-to-back to end the spring, Sheza Alibi was sent out a prohibitive $1.50 favourite for her resumption in the Armanasco.
With Zac Spain replacing suspended Moody regular Luke Nolen in the saddle, she secured favourite backers their cash, but only after a couple of anxious moments in the home straight.
Jumping from barrier one of nine, Sheza Alibi travelled fifth on the fence behind a keen tempo. She entered the straight full of running but with seemingly nowhere to go, as Spain first looked right but then switched back to the rail.
Eventually, tiring leader Chateau Eze (Frankel) drifted just wide enough off the rail to allow Sheza Alibi a narrow space, and she charged through it like the class animal she so obviously is to power away and score by 2.25 lengths.
Ciaron Maher’s Group 2 winner Salty Pearl (Tagaloa) worked home well from worse than midfield to take second as $5 second favourite.
Moody and co-trainer Katherine Coleman showed they could prosper at both ends of the market as their $31 longshot Mystery ’N’ Drama (Lucky Vega) took third in her first try at black type.
Relieved and delighted, Moody said the victory had vindicated the stable’s change of mind in deciding to not run Sheza Alibi at Flemington last week.
Whilst that meant a tilt at next weekend’s Australian Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) couldn’t be pursued, he said the former Rockhampton-trained revelation might try to make up for it in the Randwick Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) on March 7.
Beyond that, the future looks exciting to say the least. Moody said Sheza Alibi would be kept to a brief autumn campaign, with the thought of greater riches in the spring in mind.
“There won’t be a deep campaign … and we’ll be back for the spring,” he said.
“You dream of her – could she be a Cox Plate filly? But at worst, well it’s a terrible thing to say ‘at worst’, you’ve got a race like the Golden Eagle, you’ve got the Empire Rose.
“There’s a lot of options, so we just need to make sure we look after her.”
Moody added the filly’s knockabout Queensland grazier owner Fred Noffke was happy to let him and Coleman decide Sheza Alibi’s program, but “more importantly, he’s happy for the horse to steer the ship”.
“We’ve got the fillies’ option at Flemington in two weeks over a mile [the G2 Kewney Stakes], or the Randwick Guineas, and if she needs another week we can maybe look at something in Sydney beyond that,” he said.
Coleman said she was “thrilled” for Spain, saying he’d made the right call to wait for a rails run in the straight.
“Thankfully, he had the horse underneath him to accelerate like that,” she said. “We were hoping that she would be able to produce for him when he needed her to.
“Geez she’s exciting, this filly. You don’t want to get too ahead of yourself but I think she’s something really special.”
Spain said he was mightily relieved when the inside run opened up.
“I was just going so well,” he said. “Good horses get you out of trouble. I wanted to try and hold the box seat but I would’ve been out of my comfort zone, so I had to just let her travel in hand and just believe in her, really.”
Bred by veteran Queensland breeder Fred Mansour, Sheza Alibi was bought by Noffke as a weanling in an Inglis Digital Sale in June 2023, for just $10,000, with Middlebrook Valley Lodge the consignor. She’s now won $693,000.
Noffke started her in Rockhampton with Kris Hansen, for whom she won her second start in that city and her third in Townsville, before graduating to black type for a second in Eagle Farms’ Tatts Stakes (Listed, 1400m) behind subsequent Caulfield Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) hero Autumn Boy (The Autumn Sun).
She was then transferred to Moody and Coleman at Pakenham, where she became a budding national superstar.
The bay filly is the fourth of five foals for Sheza Gypsy (Shaft), and her only placegetter from four to race. Before Sheza Alibi’s emergence, the mare wasn’t served in 2023 or 2024, but was covered by Newgate Farm’s $44,000 (inc GST) stallion Ozzmosis (Zoustar) last spring.
Saxon Warrior, who stands for Coolmore in Ireland for €10,000 (approx. A$16,600), has 58 winners from 108 Australian starters, with one stakes winner and two stakes placegetters.
Sheza Alibi ranks as the 11-year-old’s second-best performer worldwide, behind his sole elite winner Victoria Road, who took the Breeders’ Cup Juvenile Turf (Gr 1, 1600m).