CAULFIELD prepares for another two of the season’s Group One races with the $350,000 Underwood Stakes and the $350,000 Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes, which take place over 1800m and 1400m respectively on Saturday, foremost on its nine race card.
The Underwood invariably attracts a number of Cox Plate and Caulfield Cup aspirants and this year is no exception, with the David Hayes-trained Miss Finland and her stablemate, last season’s Caulfield Cup victor, Tawqeet, taking on WA star and Cox Plate fancy, Marasco.
Miss Finland (Redoute’s Choice – Forest Pearl by Woodman) will jump from barrier seven in the 13-strong field as she goes head to head with the Fred Kersley-trained last start Group 2 winner, Marasco , in a race which may well decide Cox Plate favouritism. For now, at least.
Kersley has set up his training base at Caulfield and refuses to regard the course as a bogey track for the five-year-old son of Scenic. Marasco has drawn one barrier inside Miss Finland at a track where he has been the runner-up on four occasions, dating back to the Group I C. F. Orr Stakes, Australian Cup and Group 2 St George Stakes last autumn and the Group 2 Liston Stakes behind Apache Cat on August 18.
Bred in Western Australia by his principal owner Neville Duncan, Marasco is out of the moderately performed Bluegrass Belle (by Is It True). She has proved a better success at stud, in addition to Marasco, she has also produced Siesta Bay, also by Scenic, the winner of two listed events. Bluegrass Belle is a half-sister to the West Australian stakes winners, Hot Shot Brother (by Key Business) and Cool Business (by Key Business).
Blutigeroo and Maybe Better, are both on a seven-day back up after running in last week’s Group 2 Dato’ Tan Chin Nam Stakes at Moonee Valley.
Blutigeroo (by Encounter from Shanghai Sky by Zamazaan) ran a respectable ninth last week when he found the journey too short and he appears to be ticking over nicely with the Cups in mind. The chestnut has a rider change on Saturday with Damien Oliver, rejoining him in the weight-for-age feature. Oliver won the Hobart Cup and The BMW aboard on the son of Encounter last season.
Blutigeroo’s dam, Shanghai Sky, has also produced the Group 3 Grafton Cup (2400m) winner, Catapult (by Luskin Star) and the imprint of her sire, the wonderful stamina influence, Zamazaan is there for all to see in Blutigeroo and Catapult, both of which were sired by the Champion two year olds of their year.
Maybe Better (Intergaze) , is also set to confirm his high rating for the Caulfield Cup and Melbourne Cup. He is on an intentional back-up from the Brian Mayfield-Smith yard after his sixth placing in last week’s Group 2 Dato’ Tan Chin Nam Stakes.
Maybe Better is best remembered as being the first Australian-trained horse home in last years Melbourne Cup, when third. His stamina defies his pedigree to a degree, as he’s out of the Rubiton mare, Amarula who only one race over 1300m, although, she is out of the Listed winning Riverlord mare Normandy Bay whose career highlight was victory in the Listed Stanley Plate (2000m) at Caulfield in 1986.

UNDERWOOD STAKES - TAB Sportsbet Market

MISS FINLAND $2.00
MARASCO $2.40
ESKIMO QUEEN $9.00
MAYBE BETTER $17.00
TAWQEET $21.00
MASLINS BEACH $35.00
KING OF ASHFORD $35.00
ROAD WORKER $35.00
BLUTIGEROO $51.00
RUBISCENT $51.00
ANNENKOV $101.00
DANE EMPIRE $101.00
MASTERCRAFT $151.00

In what may well be a world first bloodhound.net.au has developed a sales report “SALES OUTCOME WITH SALES PRICES which will display, at the click of a mouse, the results of past sales, in merit order (from Gr1 winners down to unplaced runners), complete with the sales price for each horse. The reports are interactive, so by clicking on each horse’s name further reports can be generated. Percentages of runners, winners, stakes winners etc are displayed, and at the bottom of the report the total prizemoney won by graduates of the sale is shown, including overseas runners.

Report 712 as it is labelled on the Bloodhound reports menu is yet another in the extensive range of exciting and informative thoroughbred pedigree reports that are being developed to assist industry participants with their research and information gathering. To see a sample of report 712 click here.

- Andrew Reichard

The Keeneland September Yearling Sale continues to show remarkable strength after eight days, which is just past the midpoint of the 15 day sale. The best indicator of the overall health of any sale is undoubtedly the median (figure that half the horses in the sale exceeded in price) and this has risen a very respectable 11.1% to $100,000 after 1983 yearlings have been sold.

The gross and average are both down slightly but this difference can be entirely explained by the lack of a mere handful of yearlings priced between $3million and up on the opening two days. Even so the median for the first two days barely moved from last year indicating the depth and strength of the market. Gross is just over $340 million ($365plus last year, down 6.9%) while the average is $171,488, down 5% from $180,460 last year.

Please note the statistics below are for the FIRST SEVEN DAYS ONLY

Keeneland first seven days in $US
year	no sold	gr.	avg.	med.
2001	1610	234,127,500	145,421	62,000
2002	1710	188,801,100	110,410	60,000
2003	1690	247,770,500	146,610	75,000
2004	1712	285,729,700	166,898	90,000
2005	1775	339,659,000	191,357	95,000
2006	1729	349,955,500	202,403	100,000
2007	1697	324,091,200	190,979	120,000

Considering the recent jitters on Wall Street caused by the subprime crisis Keeneland September cannot be viewed as anything other than a resounding success. Worldwide bloodstock markets do tend to strongly follow trends in the stock market and the bigger than expected cut in rates just announced by the US Federal Reserve should help to shore up confidence on Wall Street.

Industry participants in Australia and New Zealand will be watching with interest to see if this strength flows through to Australasian financial markets and in turn to our sales series. We certainly could do with some good news following the pall of gloom that has been cast over the entire industry, particularly in Australia by the outbreak of Equine Influenza over the past three weeks.

- Andrew Reichard

 

The stallions.com.au website is already one of the busiest in the industry, so we’ve decided to offer our thousands of users access to each others products and services, items for sale etc. in our new FREE classified advertising section.

To make use of this exciting new service simply submit your information (maximum 50 words) on the advertising template located here. There is also a list of terms and conditions and a tips section as a guide for users.

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