Te Akau Monday Update

David writes:

Karyn and I had a brilliant day at Ellerslie on Saturday.  It was a good crowd, lots of on-course attendees and best of all - hundreds of young people enjoying themselves - and of course the great racing on offer!  The track had some give in it and was a credit I thought to the team at Ellerslie.

The Waikato is now in the middle of a real drought and it is the driest at Te Akau that I can ever remember, nevertheless the stock is all in great shape.  The horses of course are loving this weather and are all thriving in the sunshine.

Our breaking in process is in full flight now and the first young horses have taken to their tasks like the proverbial ducks to water!  Today we will start breaking in a team of half a dozen - it is so exciting watching all these beautiful young horses working around the farm.

Shares in our horses have sold so quickly this year - over 65 first time owners have joined the Te Akau team so a warm welcome to you!  We also have lots of our current owners re-investing with us - thank you too for your vote of confidence!

This week we are promoting our Melbourne Cup Syndicate - these two colts are two of the most special types you will ever see in terms of staying credentials.  As individuals too, they are strapping, strong boys and we are very excited about their potential.

We will be looking to see them run in the Group 1 Derby in two years' time then hopefully the Auckland/Melbourne Cups the following season.

The first is a Zabeel colt and they are now finished forever, no more Zabeel colts! There is only one Zabeel weanling colt remaining and he will probably be kept by his breeder.  With the retirement of Zabeel, an era is over.  The other colt is by a great sire of stayers in Pentire and he is out of the Zabeel mare Zambezi (and of course Zabeel has been the Australasian champion broodmare sire for the past two seasons)!  Te Akau actually trained Zambezi, she was one of the best staying mares we have ever had but sadly a race track injury cut her career short and we never saw the very best of her - definitely Group 1 material.

I thought these two colts were fantastic buying at $150,000 and $70,000 respectively.

Here they are - please feel free to call me on 07 825 4701 today if you want to be involved in this action ... or email Karyn on [email protected]

Our ZABEEL / MISS ZAPPER colt

Our PENTIRE / ZAMBEZI colt