Day: 29 September 2024

Matamata is set to host the Gr.1 Arrowfield Stud Plate (1600m) for the second time in three years after a slippery track forced the abandonment of Saturday’s blockbuster race meeting at Hastings. The second day of the Hawke’s Bay Spring Carnival had promised so much, with quality fields set to compete under blue skies. But a short burst of rain late on Friday afternoon created a slippery layer on the surface of the track, which was rated Good4 on Friday and Soft5 on Saturday morning. The effects of that moisture…

Elite New Zealand racehorse Desert Lightning (NZ) (Pride Of Dubai) has made a perfect start to the next chapter of his career, capturing Saturday’s Gr.3 Sandown Stakes (1500m) in his second start for new trainers Peter Moody and Katherine Coleman. Desert Lightning was a five-race winner and million-dollar earner in New Zealand for the now-retired training team of Peter and Dawn Williams. He finished fourth in the Gr.1 Sistema Stakes (1200m) as a two-year-old and second in the Gr.1 New Zealand 2000 Guineas (1600m) at three, then went to a…

Love Poem propelled herself up the fixed-odds market for the Gr.1 New Zealand 1000 Guineas (1600m) with a dominant first-up performance at Te Rapa on Friday. The highly talented Snitzel filly was a stakes placegetter in all of her three starts as a two-year-old. She was runner-up to Captured By Love (Written Tycoon) on debut in the Gr.3 Taranaki 2YO Classic (1200m), then finished third behind Captured By Love and Alabama Lass (Alabama Express) in the Gr.2 Matamata Breeders’ Stakes (1200m). In her only other start, she ran second to…