Nightline set to make headlines for Team Sears
Following the recent retirement of Antino, Redwood (High Chaparral) is in need of another headline horse and Westbury Stud’s quiet achiever may well have found one in the shape of Nightline, who rocketed into Queensland Oaks (Gr 1, 2200m) calculations with her eye-catching win in the Gold Coast Bracelet (Listed, 1800m).
Nightline, a NZ$75,000 purchase at Book 2 of the 2024 NZB National Yearling Sale, put paid to her rivals in a mere matter of strides at the Gold Coast last Saturday and if she could follow-up with a repeat performance in The Roses (Gr 2, 2000m) in just under two weeks’ time, the filly would start at compressed odds in the staying classic at Eagle Farm in early June.
A Group 1 victory has thus far eluded her co-trainers Tony and Maddysen Sears, who teamed up with respected bloodstock agents Paul Moroney and Catheryne Bruggeman at Karaka to acquire the first foal out of the unraced mare Decimal (El Roca) – whose half-brother Fontelina (Testa Rossa) was a multiple stakes winner for Anthony Cummins.
Team Sears have come agonisingly close to sampling elite-level success, most notably through their iron horse Yellow Brick (The Mission) when he just failed to run down War Machine (Harry Angel) in last year’s Stradbroke Handicap (Gr 1, 1400m).
But the family patriarch believes that Nightline – whose younger brother sold for $100,000 to Patrick Payne at Karaka this year – possesses both the credentials and constitution to end the stable’s drought and deliver a seventh Group 1 victory for her sire, who will stand at the Gerry Harvey-owned Westbury Stud for NZ$6,000 (plus GST) this season.
“She was very good on Saturday and she’s already won over the Oaks distance in the Eagle Way at the start of the year, so the trip won’t worry her at all,” Tony Sears told ANZ News.
“She’s also got great versatility in that she handles most conditions. She probably prefers getting her toe in the ground but it won’t bother her either way, most of the Redwoods seem to handle all conditions so she’s fairly typical of the breed in that respect.
“The better horses go on anything, and she’s probably the best filly we’ve trained on what we’ve seen. Antino was a star for Redwood and this filly looks another standout, so hopefully she can be the horse to win a first Group 1 for us.”
Nightline currently shares $5 favouritism alongside recent Australasian Oaks (Gr 1, 2000m) heroine Panova (Trapeze Artist), who is bidding to become the first filly since the Chris Waller-trained Egg Tart (Sebring) in 2017 to achieve the rare Oaks double.
At $26, Nightline’s stablemate Yellow Brick is less fancied to go one better in this year’s Stradbroke Handicap, which takes place on the Saturday after the Oaks; but having recently returned to action with a power-packed performance under Tommy Berry to justify favouritism in Rockhampton’s $1 million slot race The Archer (1300m), the six-year-old would appear to be improving with age.
With all due respect to the field in The Archer, Yellow Brick will face a much sterner examination at his next start in the Kingsford-Smith Cup (Gr 1, 1300m) on Saturday week, when the likes of Ciaron Maher’s multiple Group 1 winner Jimmysstar (Per Incanto) will be standing in his way.
However, Sears believes the horse affectionately known in the stables as “Brickie” – a $20,000 bargain buy who is on the brink of banking $4 million in prize-money – is well capable of registering a first Group 1 triumph for his unheralded sire The Mission (Choisir).
“I do think he’s going even better this time than he was last year,” Sears said.
“He was well-weighted to win The Archer, but you still have to go up there and do it. Tommy rode him perfectly and we’re hoping he’ll stick with him over the winter carnival, but we haven’t had that 100 per cent confirmed yet.
“He’s a very consistent horse but the biggest thing for him is getting a dry track, because he really doesn’t like the wet. But if he gets a firm surface in the Kingsford-Smith or the Stradbroke, then I think he’s got a very good chance in either race.”
Both Yellow Brick and Nightline were identified at their respective sales by Moroney and Bruggeman, a formidable partnership who for the past six seasons have celebrated more than a century of winners with their purchases for a burgeoning book of clients.
Nightline took Moroney’s tally of individual stakes winners to 164 at the weekend, and the brother of the much-missed trainer Mike Moroney is brimming with confidence that she can now go on to become the 41st Group 1 winner he has secured at the sales since starting out in the industry more than three decades ago.
“Catherine and I thought she was the standout filly across the two books at Karaka that year, and while you don’t always get it right it looks like she will more than justify the high opinion we had of her,” Moroney told ANZ News.
“We thought she was an absolute stunner, so we both fell in love with her instantly. I’ve had success with her family in the past, going back two generations on the dam’s side, so everything aligned and we pushed very hard for Tony and Maddy to buy her. Redwood flies under the radar, he’s probably seen more as a bread-and-butter stallion but he can occasionally produce a very good horse, and I think she falls into that category.
“She definitely has the capability of winning an Oaks, but as you saw when she came out of the pack on Saturday, she has a terrific turn of foot, so she’s certainly not one-dimensional. It augurs very well for her future and when I spoke to Tony on Saturday after the races, he said she’s the best filly he’s trained by some distance.
“We’ve had a great association with the stable stretching back many years now, so it would be great if either this filly or Yellow Brick could help Tony reach the pinnacle of his training career with an elusive first Group 1 win, before he steps aside and hands over the full-time reins to Maddy.”