Another David Ellis Group 1 Purchase

Star kiwi galloper War Affair (NZ) (O'Reilly) was at his devastating best on Friday night, easily accounting for Singapore's best three-year-olds in the Sgp-1 S$500,000 Singapore Guineas (1600m).

Purchased by David Ellis from the draft of Trelawney Stud for $70,000 - he has now won nine of his twelves starts and eclipsed $1.4 million in prizemoney.

Last season, under the guidance of Te Akau Singapore trainer Mark Walker, War Affair cruised to the title of Champion 2YO of Singapore.  The top juvenile has now claimed a clean sweep of the Singapore Three-Year-Old Challenge. It was the son of O'Reilly's third Singapore series success having won both the Golden Horseshoe 2YO Series and the More Magic 3YO Series last season.

It was expected that War Affair would win Friday night's feature race as he started a hot race-favourite but it was the fashion with which he disposed of the field by four lengths and smashing the track record that enthralled most followers.

In fact, the performance by War Affair impressed Australian rider Danny Beasley so much that the Golden Slipper winning jockey declared him the best horse he has ridden in Singapore.

“I've won a few Group 1 races, but he's pretty special as far as special horses go,” commented Beasley. “He's got such an explosive turn of foot and once I let him go to the front, it would have taken a very good horse to come back at me.

“A lot of people didn't believe me, but fair dinkum, I've always said he's a very good horse. But it would be unfair for me to compare him with Grand Armee (the best horse Beasley has been associated with in Australia) but he is definitely the best I've ridden in Singapore.”

It was left to the remaining kiwis to battle out the minor placings with Daniel (NZ) (Guillotine) finishing second, Goodman (NZ) (Alamosa) in third and our own Te Akau trained Rise ‘n' Shine (NZ) (Zabeel -at just his first prep.) completing a New Zealand first four.

War Affair is out of unraced American mare Kristique (Kris S.), a daughter of four-time Group 1 winner Nastique (Naskra) who is the dam of Group 3 winner Thunder Kitten (Storm Cat) and Jpn-1 winner Nobo True (Broad Bush).

"The moment I set eyes on him I thought 'now there is a horse I can see developing into a top flight galloper' when we broke him in you could visualise what a lovely indivdiual he was set to become. It is such a thrilled to see him perform so well at the elite level, including breaking the track record," said his purchaser David Ellis.