Te Akau Monday Update

David writes:

It has been another really exciting weekend of racing for the team.  In Singapore Te Akau celebrated Mark training three winners - what a phenomenal achievement to record three winners in a weekend.

What impressed me most was that just about every horse that was expected do race well did indeed do that!  We also had many placings to add to the winning trio.

The weekend also saw what was probably the final race for Precious Time before she heads to Redoute's Choice to be served.  This mare raced by Christopher and Susannah Grace ran a super race for second in the Murwillumbah Cup in Queensland.  It was a really top effort after she was held up in the straight and zipped down the outside to be narrowly denied.  Her foal when born will be a full in blood to the stunning Lankan Rupee so exciting times ahead for the Grace's.

In recent days, it was really sad news to hear of the passing of Baggy Hillis, the father of Wayne and Paul.  Baggy was one of the real characters of racing and I remember when I was a young guy I used to go out and watch track work at Takanini - he would always have a bottle of beer the moment the horses finished work and then go on and have breakfast.

From memory the last Great Northern Steeplechase I went to at Queen's Birthday weekend (when it used to be staged in June) was when he won the Great Northern double, winning the hurdle on Saturday and the steeplechase by 40 lengths on Monday with Brockton who was trained by Colin Jillings.

Baggy has two sons who have also won Great Northern's - Paul and Wayne and I think Wayne was involved in the only dead heat seen in the Great Northern Steeplechase - at Queen's Birthday the stand was always packed out - the turnover on the Monday was always over $1 million on course.

This week we are busy planting 25 trees around the farm - I have decided that each year we are going to plant 25 trees for 10 years so that will give us 250 additional trees on the farm.

It's a busy week this week with a lot of owners coming to see their horses and Karyn and I are flat out tidying everything up because on Sunday we are taking a month off and we are going to Honolulu for a break.

The great thing about farming at the moment is the mild winter we are having.  It is incredible in farming how seasons even out - if you have a dry summer and don't grow much grass, the chances are you will have a good autumn and early winter.  At present we have more grass than I can ever remember seeing on the farm.

The other headline news is that our wonderful Robyn is back from her European sojourn - looking great, tanned and relaxed.  We can't wait to hear the stories about her adventures!