Te Akau Midweek Update

David writes:

I went over to Matamata to our racing stable on Monday afternoon to spend some time with the team.  it was great to see everything humming along brilliantly in the hands of Stephen, Jamie and Pam.  I took the opportunity to inspect every horse in the stable and I was thrilled with the way the horses are looking.

On Tuesday morning I was up early at the track to cast my eye over early monring trackwork and again it was very evident how steamlined our training transition has been. We are lucky to welcome back Stephen Autridge, he's such a good horse man and already he knows every horse in the stable and has really hit the ground running.

Today is an exciting day for Jamie Richards as he will have his first runners today as a trainer and appropriately the race meeting is at "home" - Matamata. There is nothing I would love more than to see the new team kick off with a win today.

Today it is a busy day at the farm as well as the stable - I have the Waikato District Mayor coming with his staff to inspect Te Akau Stud and to also seek my views on various regional matters - ecomonic and others.  It should be a very interesting meeting.

This morning I was down on the airstrip watching the horses that we are breaking in going through their paces. I know I have said this before but one colt that is really impressing me is the O'Reilly colt out of the Zabeel mare Royal Era.  Royal Era won five races in her career including the Listed Rotorua Plate where she beat home the "People's Champion" Sir Slick and smart gelding Elblitzem.

This colt is bred on a unbelievable cross which has produced Group 1 winners Silent Achiever and O'Marilyn plus many other good winners.  So out of a Zabeel mare - it doesn't get much better than this - Zabeel mares have produced so many superstars that the grand stallion has been awarded the Champion Australasian Broodmare Sire title multiple times.  It's a great recipe!

STOP PRESS: the first runner for Te Akau's Autridge/Richards team has just been narrowly beaten into second!  A win looks close for Chadsdale.