Business

Thursday’s second day of the 2023 New Zealand Bloodstock Ready to Run Sale saw a new all-time record price of $825,000 for a Star Turn colt whose future lies in Hong Kong.

Saturday’s Listed Counties Challenge Stakes (1100m) brings together four of the six winners of two-year-old races in the North Island so far this season, and Cambridge trainer Tony Pike is hoping to see his runaway debut winner Poetic Champion rise to the occasion in the star-studded Pukekohe clash.

It is often a case of catch me if you can with Johny Johny, and trainers Tim and Margaret Carter are hoping their pacemaking sprinter can outrun his rivals again in Saturday’s Gr.3 Haunui Farm Counties Bowl (1100m).

Black-type performer Flower Of Wanaka will depart from Chrissy Bambry’s stable early in the new year, but the Foxton trainer is aiming high during her final few weeks with the Burgundy mare.

Cambridge trainer Tony Pike spent Sunday morning contemplating some mixed results from the racing action at Pukekohe twenty-four hours earlier where his stable picked up an impressive victory with Rudyard in the last race on the day after some frustrating placings earlier.

New Zealand import Jimmysstar kept his unblemished Australian record intact with a super-impressive win in Saturday’s A$175,000 Freeway Ford Shooting Stars (1500m) at Cranbourne.

John Thompson’s concerns about heavy track conditions were quickly extinguished by With Your Blessing at Kembla Grange on Saturday, powering to a commanding front-running win in the A$160,000 Evergreen Turf Australia Handicap (1200m).

In a contest largely focussed on glamour mare Babylon Berlin, talented entire Sacred Satono made the most of his six-kilogram weight advantage to storm home in the Gr.3 Haunui Farm Counties Bowl (1100m) on Saturday at Pukekohe.

With trainer and part-owner Joe Pride watching on from afar, New Zealand-bred gelding King Of The Castle took his career earnings past A$500,000 with a typically tenacious performance in Saturday’s A$160,000 Traffic Logistics Handicap (1600m) at Kembla Grange.

With a spectacular performance in The Illawarra Mercury Gong (1600m) at Kembla Grange on Saturday, Detonator Jack delivered a second consecutive New Zealand-bred victory in the A$1 million race.

One Bold Cat took his promising career to a new level in Saturday’s Gr.3 Counties Cup (2100m) at Pukekohe, delivering a third feature prize of the month for Robbie Patterson.

Almost all of the spring’s brightest two-year-old talent gathered at Pukekohe on Saturday for New Zealand’s first black-type juvenile race of the season, but it was the unbeaten filly Velocious who soared above her contemporaries and dominated the Listed Counties Challenge Stakes (1100m).