Yarraman Park’s I Am Invincible has experienced any number of highlights over the past couple of seasons: Home Affairs, Imperatriz, In Secret, Lombardo and Marabi to name just a handful of his Group 1 winners.
Not surprisingly, such success has been reflected in the sales ring with 17 of his yearlings already in 2023 knocked down for $1 million or greater.
However, his most recent stakes winner – #95 – is the largely unheralded 7YO gelding Fifteen Rounds who captured last Saturday’s Listed Australian Turf Club Trophy at the Sunshine Coast for some very happy owners.
From the multiple stakes winning North American mare, Sugar Bay, Fifteen Rounds was originally sold to Joe Pride for $200,000 at the 2017 Inglis Easter Yearling Sale, but wasn’t sighted until late in his 2YO season, winning a Kembla maiden.
Despite a few placings, Fifteen Rounds didn’t salute at his next 11 outings and was subsequently sold for $30,000 at the 2020 Inglis August Online Sale.
Transferred to Darren Egan and then Barry Lockwood in August 2021, Queensland’s sunnier climes and nifty ‘footwork’ have obviously worked wonders for the gelding, winning four of his last five starts and, heading into the ATC Cup, a half length second at Doomben in April.
With a record of nine wins and 11 placings from 38 outings, Fifteen Rounds is rapidly approaching $400k in prizemoney – the vast majority of that stake since his online sale.
Bred by Ron and Rod Dufficy, the former was quick to praise Lockwood for his management of the horse, declaring on Twitter that the Eagle Farm trainer was a “genius (at) managing horse’s feet”.
Fifteen Rounds certainly has had plenty of issues with his feet, causing massive headaches for all three of his trainers.
“Darren got a couple of wins out of him at Dubbo on soft and heavy tracks which obviously aided the horse, and when he came here to me there was just no foot … nothing to nail them on to,” Lockwood recalls. “We’ve had to glue them on and carefully manage where he races but it seems to be working because he’s won six in town and now a stakes race.
“We’re not getting too far ahead of ourselves, but at this stage we’ll run him in the (Group 3) BRC Sprint (at Doomben) on Saturday week and if he’s still going OK, we might have a crack at the Ramornie (12 July).”
Seems you can knock a Vinnie off their feet but they’ll keep getting back up!
