Windborne's Dress Rehearsal

The Informant reports:

The flying filly Windborne faces her toughest test yet against a smart field of juveniles in the Gr. 3 Barneswood Farm Eclipse Stakes at Ellerslie, but it will also be an ideal stepping stone towards a million-dollar mission later in the month.

“There's no doubt she'll improve through this race and it'll be a nice lead-in to the Karaka Million,” trainer Jason Bridgman told The Informant.

A sister to Bridgman's New Zealand 1000 Guineas runner-up Darci's Dream, Windborne has proven to be more precocious than her sibling with blistering wins in both starts to date. On debut at Ellerslie she swept to the lead 200 metres from home and scored an emphatic win, breaking 33 seconds for the last 600.

Then she stepped up to Listed level and produced a similarly decisive turn of foot to win the Murdoch Newell Stakes at Avondale. In the process she beat Showboy, who subsequently won the Gr. 2 Wakefield Challenge Stakes at Trentham and is a race rival again tomorrow.

Windborne has not raced since the Avondale victory on November 22, but Bridgman says the Darci Brahma filly has thrived in her time away from the races.

“She's done really well,” he said. “In fact she's probably done a little bit better than I'd like. She's had a quite a big gap between races, but I think it's better to race slightly less heading towards the Karaka Million, rather than having four runs coming into it.”

While this may be primarily a dress rehearsal for the dash for cash on January 25, Windborne should not be underestimated in tomorrow's $70,000 feature. She has shown the ability to run exceptional times and has twice demonstrated a very sharp turn of foot down the home straight.

“She's a good filly and she'll take some beating,” Bridgman said.