Gold Circle Pty (Ltd)

Today's Racing :

Trotter busy ahead of breeze-up

David Thiselton
Jane Trotter’s Ambleway Thoroughbred Stables in Pieter-maritzburg, one of the most popular spelling farms in KwaZulu-Natal, is at its busiest at this time of the season and this year is no different.
She has 69 two-year-olds, either being prepared to be put into training or being prepared for the forthcoming Ready To Run Sale “breeze up” gallops, which take place at Summerhill Stud this Friday, October 16.
Trotter has 14 workriders and four or five strings are sent out in the mornings from 6.30am, ending at about 9.30am. Those horses that are on the injury list are then walked until about 10am. Trotter is preparing eleven two-year-olds for the Summerhill “breeze ups”, eight from Highlands Farm Stud and three from Marlon Aronstram’s Anfield Stud.
Trotter has become an expert in the delicate process of building these young horses up to be both physically and mentally ready for the breeze up gallops.
On the day they are required to go about 800m of the track at the Mooi River farm, with the last couple of furlongs usually done at pace in order to impress the patrons, who are made up mainly of prospective buyers and media and gather in a marquee at the end of the gallop. The horses usually arrive at Ambleway as yearlings from May to July. Trotter starts there schooling with trotting and the next step is to hack canter them on the bit. From there they step up in cantering speed. She takes them on the float to Summerhill at least twice before the day. This is to get them used to both the transport and the surrounds of the breeze up track.
Two of the Anfield Stud horses for the Ready To Run Sale were imported and had “dropped away” quite a bit while in quarantine.
To build them up has been a tougher task than with the locally bred one.
The Highlands lots were already quite strong upon arrival, having been out in the veld for much of their lives up until then.
The locally bred Anfield Stud youngster is the first lot on the sale, Client King, and is a Caesour colt out of the On Stage mare Fairy Palace, who is a half-sister to the Gold Cup winner, Voodoo Charm.
Both of the imported Anfield horses are Brazilian-bred. One is a black colt, who is from one of the last crops of one of the leading sires in Brazil, the late Roi Normand. The other is a grey colt by multiple Grade 1 winner, Siphon, who won the Santa Anita Handicap. This colt’s dam is by Ski Champ out of a mare who was placed in Brazil’s Grade 1 Oaks and 1000 Guineas.
Trotter reckoned that one of the best of the Highlands lots was Wolf On The Fold, a Windrush bay colt out of a USA-bred Mr. Greeley mare.
She also liked the other Windrush colt, lot 141, Tyler’s Talent, who was even an earlier August foal and is also out of a USA-bred mare, the Cryptoclearance mare, Code Eleven, who is a half-sister to a Grade 1 winner.
Trotter felt that one of the nicest movers from Highland’s was lot 138, a grey National Assembly filly, who she and the Ambleway staff have joked is there own National Colour. Another lot she regarded as very good looking, and smart, was lot 105, Cheery Berry Bim, a chestnut Spectrum filly, who is a half-sister to the promising Onehundredacrewood. The other Spectrum from Highlands, lot 12, Hopes And Desires, is a bay colt out of a National Assembly mare, who is in turn out of a half-sister to the Grade 1 sprinter All Will Be Well.
Another “strong horse” on the Highlands list is lot 19, Nanda Devi, who is by the late Camden Park, sire of South Africa’s highest ever earner, Jay Peg.
This bay colt is out of a three-time-winning USA-bred mare by Lemon Drop Kid, who was the Eclipse Champion older male in 2000.

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