Slipper winner Stay Inside off the mark as Incognito impresses in Breeder’s Plate
Newgate Farm’s Golden Slipper (Gr 1, 1200m)-winning stallion Stay Inside (Extreme Choice) exploded out of the gates as a sire when his first runner, million-dollar colt Incognito, completed a circle for trainer Michael Freedman in taking Saturday’s Breeders’ Plate (Gr 3, 1000m) at Randwick.
Freedman and his brother Richard prepared Stay Inside for his 2021 Slipper triumph before the pair went their separate ways, and the irrepressible progress Michael has made since establishing his own Randwick stable is well poised to continue with a host of formidable young runners.
Incognito looks set to be another of them.
The handsome colt was bred by Black Soil Bloodstock – formerly the BoomTime Racing team behind Spirit Of Boom (Sequalo) – and was offered by that stallion’s Queensland home farm, Eureka Stud, at Magic Millions Gold Coast.
Purchased for the neat $1 million by James Harron and Tony Fung’s colts partnerships, the colt wasn’t quite a headline-grabber at Sydney’s first official two-year-old trials on September 22.
Lining up in the ninth and last heat of the day, he raced in third for Tommy Berry, hit the lead at the 200 metres, but weakened late to run a 0.4 lengths third behind Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott’s Revengeance (Hellbent).
In the season’s first two-year-old race, however, Incognito looked a vastly improved horse.
Firming from $6 to $5, and with Berry keeping the ride, he sat fifth of the eight starters well off the pace set by another son of Stay Inside in second-favourite Eviction Notice, the eye-catching 7.8 lengths winner at the trials.
Berry released the brakes on Incognito entering the straight as Eviction Notice soon again advertised the frailties of trial form, weakening badly in the last 200 metres as $2.70 favourite I’m Ya Huckleberry (Home Affairs) surged towards the front.
But before that son of another keenly awaited first-season sire could take the lead, Incognito bounded to the front imposingly to his outside. I’m Ya Huckleberry stuck to his task but Incognito – straightened under hands and heels riding – carried Harron’s renowned green with gold epaulettes to a 0.3 lengths victory.
His times eclipsed that set by Shiki (Too Darn Hot) in winning the fillies’ Gimcrack Stakes (Gr 3, 1000m) 35 minutes later. Incognito set 57.31 seconds compared with the Waterhouse-Bott filly’s 57.54, while his last 600 metres of 33.98 bettered Shiki’s 34.13.
While Harron celebrated heartily in the winners’ enclosure as his latest seven-figure colt successfully completed his first step towards stallionhood, Freedman said he was delighted with the win.
“It’s a big thrill to win a race like this, but to win it with a son of a colt that we trained for the Golden Slipper is an extra big thrill,” said Freedman, blaming a lack of experience for Incognito’s late fade at the trials.
“He’s always really impressed us at home. He’s always shown he’s got a good turn of foot, which he showed in the trial, but I think he just got up beside those other horses and was having a bit of a look at them.
“We worked him with an older horse here on Tuesday morning to give him something to aim up on, and it was vastly different. He sat off the back of him and worked past him and did it well, so I thought if we could replicate that today, we’d be thereabouts.
“Tommy said to me that if we get the right sort of trail and the speed today, I know he’ll quicken up really well, which he did. “
Freedman tipped further improvement from Incognito – saying he was still taking “a little bit of a look” at I’m Ya Huckleberry to his inside late on instead of kicking clear.
The youngest Freedman brother said the colt would be sent straight out for a spell before targets in the new year, possibly the $3 million Magic Millions 2YO Classic (RL, 1200m) at the Gold Coast on January 10.
“We’ll have a chat with James [Harron] and the crew,” he said. “He is a Magic Millions graduate, so I guess that is a possibility. Otherwise, a nice break and then start focusing on the autumn.”
Berry was delighted, and a touch relieved, the million-dollar colt had lived up to his price tag and track form.
“I have been let down plenty of times in the past, so you just go there hoping they’re going to go out and do what they’ve shown us at home,” he said.
“The first time Michael’s horses are let off the bit are in their first trial and I gave him a gallop on Tuesday morning and I walked in after it and Michael and I just raised our eyebrows like, ‘Jeez, what was that?’
“He put in a really, really sharp piece of work. We knew he had come on very well since then.”
“He just knuckled a little bit at the start but I reckon that’s probably what won him the race. He came back to me lovely after that, executed himself well.
“He’s a son of Stay Inside and I really like this stallion, not just because I won a Slipper on him but his horses are so mature and they’re ready-made.”
Jockey Adam Hyeronimus said Coolmore stallion Home Affairs’ (I Am Invincible) first runner I’m Ya Huckleberry – a $400,000 Gold Coast purchase – was gallant in defeat for the Waterhouse-Bott stable.
“Disappointed not to win,” he said. “I’m on a very good horse but full credit to the winner, he quickened up well. He beat us fair and square but my horse is very exciting.”
Revengeance gave Tulloch Lodge both minor placings by running third at $8.50.
“He is a lovely horse. Just raced greenly. The last section of the race was really strong from him,” said his jockey Josh Parr.
Posting another result for the burgeoning broodmare sire career of I Am Invincible (Invincible Spirit), Incognito (2 c Stay Inside – Bleu Zebra by I Am Invincible) is the second foal out of the triple champion stallion’s daughter Bleu Zebra, a half-sister to Melbourne Listed winner Fox Swift (Foxwedge).
Third dam Pay My Bail (Justice Prevails) was New Zealand’s Champion 3YO Sprinter of 2003-04, a five-time stakes winner, and threw two black type victors in White Moss (Mossman) and White Sage (Reset).
Bleu Zebra now has a yearling filly by Darley shuttler Pinatubo (Shamardal), and a colt foal by Eureka’s Don Corleone (Extreme Choice).