By Michael Guerin
One of the first stars of the new season pacing crop in Australia will make a surprise trip to Auckland next week.
Bathurst Tiara-winning filly Ripples will come to Alexandra Park for a heat of the Young Guns Delightful Lady series next Friday and hopefully the $70,000 final on May 2.
It will also mark a rare appearance in New Zealand for a horse trained by Victorian superstar Emma Stewart, who has had incredible success on Australia’s Eastern Seaboard but while the mega stable has threatened to bring horses to New Zealand in the past they have never made it. This time they will though with owner Mick Harvey behind the idea to bring Ripples across the Tasmam.
“She was actually bred over there, out of a sister to Nike Franco, and broken in there,” says Harvey, an enormously popular figure in harness racing.
“So she is eligible and paid up for all sorts of races over there so I am keen to give her the chance to show us how good she is.
“So if things go well on this trip I’d love to bring her back for other races later in the season.”
Ripples has already looked very sharp in New South Wales, where she travelled to from her new home in Victoria, to dominate the Gold Tiara.
She bolted away with her heat and then won the A$150,000 final in a 1:53.9 mile rate for the 1730m after being three wide early then parked and still too strong in the hands of Luke McCarthy.
“She is a good filly and good on them for taking her to New Zealand, they will need a good filly to beat her over there,” says McCarthy.
Harvey has been following the New Zealand form and knows there has only been small fields for the northern juvenile fillies races so far, even though the last qualifying heat next week is expected to draw some more southerners north.
“We have spoken to Blair Orange about driving her and hope to get him and I am really excited,” says Harvey.
“Brooke Wilkins will look after her as I am sure Emma and Clayton [Tonkin] will be too busy to go across and she will stay at Nathan Purdon’s place, who I have had horses with before.”
While Stewart is unlikely to make the trip having one of her horses, especially an unbeaten Gold Tiara winner, race in New Zealand is a promising sign as her stable is a magnet for punters and any horses she sends across the Tasman can only help with turnover and eyeballs.