Te Akau Tuesday Update

David writes:

What an incredible day it was for Te Akau Racing on Saturday!

WOW - six wins and two quinellas is as bigger thrill as you could ever get. This was followed up with another win on Sunday, giving our trainer, Jamie Richards, seven wins for the weekend. And another win at Rotorua today - so proud of our team!

I would like to thank all our owners and congratulate them on the wins that they had over the weekend. Some of them have been very patient, and that patience has been very richly rewarded. 

I would like to congratulate you all! 

For those punters who have been loyal to the Tangerine, I can tell you now they got their returns in bucket loads last weekend! With a $14 dividend, a $9 dividend and an $85 quinella, it really was a successful weekend - well done to them!

It was a massive thrill to win the 1000 Guineas for Brendan and Jo Lindsay of Cambridge Stud with Kahma Lass.

Kahma Lass was ridden by  our stable jockey, Opie Bosson, and what a gem of a ride it was! it is just so great to have New Zealand's greatest rider back winning Group 1 races. If you watch the replay, you will see just how pure class the ride was. 

I bought this filly for them from the draft of Gordon Cunningham's Curraghmore Stud. Gordon does a fantastic job and is well regarded as the best at what he does in the Southern Hemisphere. Kahma Lass was bred by Greg Tomlinson's Nearco Stud - and what an incredible job Greg does. With only a small number of mares, they punch well above their weight. I believe you have a head start when you purchase a yearling from Nearco Stud.

Nearco Stud is managed by Danny Rolston who is purchasing some beautiful mares for the stud. They are going to go from strength to strength under his management. 

Cornflower Blue, one of our other runners in the 1000 Guineas, ran a super race to finish third. She was probably a bit unlucky on the rails where the track was off a little bit, where as Kahma Lass was out where the track was at it's very best. 

Another big thrill at Riccarton on Saturday was seeing Avonello take out his race. He is a 2yo that was bought and part owned by Chris Rutten and Little Avondale Stud. These are two groups of people who are big supporters of Te Akau Racing and it is a privilege to train horses for both Little Avondale Stud and Chris Rutten. Chris is a very good judge of a horse and a great person to train for.

I would like to congratulate the Canterbury Jockey Club on a simply great carnival. It is a very well organised club and the track (which took a little bit to get there) was just beautiful on last day and gave every horse a chance. 

Kahma Lass is Jamie's 11th Black Type win this season already and his fourth Group 1 winner. Now that is an incredible performance.

Jamie has now also won just under $1.5m in prize money in New Zealand alone. In Australia, he as won a further $800,000 prize money. He is currently 30 wins ahead on the Trainers Premiership table after only three and a half months into the season. 

NZ TRAINERS' PREMIERSHIP as at 17.11.20

		Wins	2nds	3rds	Stakes	Starts	G & L	SR
1	Jamie Richards	53	43	26	$1,446,985	274	9	5.17
2	Michael & Matthew Pitman	23	20	15	$524,315	180	0	7.83
3	Murray Baker & Andrew Forsman	21	26	12	$743,320	152	3	7.24
4	Stephen Marsh	19	19	30	$517,015	296	0	15.58
5	Tony Pike	16	10	15	$278,685	97	0	6.06
6	Kelvin Tyler & Aimee Tyler	14	13	7	$278,550	98	0	7
7	Kevin Myers	13	21	19	$319,060	158	0	12.15
8	Allan Sharrock	13	13	8	$257,155	72	1	5.54
9	Terri Rae	13	8	5	$267,935	59	2	4.54
10	Team Rogerson	12	16	14	$329,980	214	2	17.83
11	Peter & Dawn Williams	12	9	9	$141,835	55	0	4.58
12	Ken Rae & Krystal Williams-Tuhoro	12	7	9	$233,810	95	1	7.92
13	Fraser Auret	11	5	6	$99,825	69	0	6.27
14	Stephen Autridge & Kris Shailer	10	16	8	$212,715	78	0	7.8
15	Brian & Shane Anderton	9	7	9	$128,760	85	0	9.44

This is an incredible effort from all our team. Most of our staff have been working extremely long hours and have had fewer than normal days off due to staff being based in Riccarton Sydney and Melbourne. They have all stepped up to the plate brilliantly and I am very proud of them all.  

I was very sorry to see our stable apprentice Chelsea Burdan have a nasty fall at Waverley on Sunday. She has broken her collarbone and we are wishing her a speedy recovery. Chelsea has been riding incredibly well and has been working extremely hard at the stable. She has been riding an enormous amount of trackwork for us and has been just a massive help. She is a top young lady and while this is a minor setback for her, her time will most definitely come - I have no doubt about that.

I spent the weekend at Raglan doing a lot of research on the pedigrees for the Ready to Run sale, which starts tomorrow. 

I went through and watched every breeze up two or three times and right now, I am on my way to the sale, dictaphone in hand, making sure today's update is out today (don't worry, I wasn't driving!).

I am convinced that there is going to be some very good buying at the sale this week and if you would like to be involved, either give me a call or email Karyn - [email protected]. You could even come out to the sale and join us - you will be made to feel very welcome. The NZB Sale Complex is the best in the world and it is a great place to watch horses come through the ring. 

If you have any interest in the racing industry, now is the time in your life to become involved. 

I was rapt to see the Weigh In programme last night and the exciting news about Ellerslie, Counties and hopefully Avondale merging together. 

There is a lot of good news in New Zealand racing industry presently.

The turnovers have been at record highs and even senior management in the TAB have been pleasantly surprised at this. When you consider this, plus the fact that by next year there will be the elimination of all duty on New Zealand Racing that gives us another $10million every year plus the Racefields legislation, which will give us another $15million a year and then combine the fact that the TAB have taken around $25million of costs out of the business, you can see that stake money is going to increase, and will increase quite quickly. 

Well done to Dean McKenzie and his team at the TAB for getting racing through a very difficult time and it is great to see that we are going to come out in such great shape. 

News from the farm is that after 45mls of rain last week, the grass is absolutely bolting. Even yesterday afternoon we had 4mls and a very heavy shower which just helps the crop immensely. We have more grass now than we can handle, which is a great position to be in. 

Head Stockman at Te Akau Stud Luke Copeland, who has been working at Te Akau Stud since the day he left school, is very busy at the moment. He has three units of leaving this week, and another four next week. It is a lot of work weighing steers so that only the heavy ones sell, but he has been doing an amazing job. The average weight of the steers that we have killed in nine units so far is about 391kgs. These are incredible weights and well done to Luke, who is a very important part of the team.

Meanwhile Te Akau Stud's Equine Manager Enzo Di Leoni is very busy, as all the South Island horses have arrived home for a spell and he has been organising all the paddocks which will be best suited for them.

Need I Say More, who was the favourite for the Group 1 NZ 2000 Guineas has returned home to the farm and is absolutely thriving on the Te Akau grass. Melody Belle really is such a great horse - her head hasn't left the feed bin until the last bit of grain is cleared. She is in a very lush paddock and she is very clearly enjoying every day of her spell here at the farm.

Next week, we are having another lamb draft and we hope to get another 400 lambs away and then we will go to the post again just before Christmas with another 400. 

Have a great week everyone and good luck to NZB with this Ready to Run sale. To our owners who have runners this weekend -

GO THE TANGERINE!

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