There was a busy set of trials at Canterbury on Tuesday morning with five heats over 900m for juveniles that featured a winning double for Trapeze Artist and an interesting Justify (USA) colt for Yulong that has been named Willingham, which is the name under which they have been buying at the recent Northern Hemisphere breeding stock sale.
This Willingham was bought by Yulong as a weanling at Magic Millions for $180,000 and was then passed in and retained when they re-offered him at Inglis Easter earlier this year.
He was sent to the stable of Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott, who prepared his close relation, Golden Slipper winner Farnan, and he stepped out for the first time this morning.
Willingham did everything right sitting off the leader and when asked to run that horse down was able to do so scoring by a head over his stablemate Farset, a son of Farnan that was also having his first trial.
Willingham is the first foal of Yolanda, a winning half-sister by Shamus Award to Group III winner Tallow, the dam of Farnan.
Baldy faced Snitzel filly Rainbow Glow impressed us in her first trial last month when she ran second and she did again this morning when she showed brilliant speed to lead and was held together to finish second again with Trapeze Artist filly Artistic Venture finishing over the top to take a narrow win at her first trial for John O’Shea and Tom Charlton
She carries the Tricolours Racing colours that were successful last Saturday at Rosehill on modestly priced filly The Playrwight and they look to have bought well here with Artistic Venture a $50,000 Inglis Classic purchase for them from Widden Stud.
The second heat winner for Trapeze Artist was the Annabel Neasham and Rob Archibald trained colt Southern Prince, who improved sharply at his second trial. This time he was able to surge late to snatch a narrow win in a blanket finish.
Passed in as a yearling and retained by his breeder Bert Vieira, Southern Prince is a half-brother to a remarkable 10 winners including the dam of Group III winner Sweet Ride being from terrific producer Southern Venture, a stakes-placed daughter of Zabeel.
Additional trials were won by a couple of promising types in Horseshoe Hill and Memo, who was third on debut in the Group III ATC Gimcrack Stakes on debut.
Capitalist filly Memo looks to have come back from a short break in good order for Peter Snowden and the Magic Millions eligible filly looked super professional sitting in behind the leader before angling into the clear and lengthening to win by a head under a hold.
Memo was a $350,000 Magic Millions purchase from Newgate and is the second foal of Group III placed Fastnet Rock mare Notation.
The Bjorn Baker trained All Too Hard filly Horsehoe Hill looked to have good potential off this second trial when she travelled three deep all the way and was much too good at the finish.
A $200,000 Magic Millions purchase from Widden Stud for Bjorn Baker Racing/Clarke Bloodstock Pty Ltd (FBAA)/Cunningham Thoroughbreds, Horsehoe Hill is from Group II winning Encosta de Lago mare Miss Rose De Lago.
Click here for all the trial results at Breednet with Sale Mail and at Racing NSW with video.
