Shaune Ritchie and Colm Murray scooped the major Cups last season with Mahrajaan (Kitten’s Joy), and with the ultimate two-mile contest now on their radar, he will appear for the first time this season at Ruakaka on Saturday.
After being purchased out of the Tattersalls Autumn Horses In Training Sale in 2022, Mahrajaan more than proved himself on Kiwi soil last season, winning both the Gr.3 New Zealand Cup (3200m) and Gr.2 Auckland Cup (3200m).
His Cambridge trainers opted to contest the Gr.1 Sydney Cup (3200m) after his phenomenal form over the distance, but a long and successful season was telling as he finished back in the field.
After a deserved holiday, Ritchie and Murray have their sights set on another Australian mission with the son of Kitten’s Joy, this time the Gr.1 Melbourne Cup (3200m) at Flemington in November.
The long road to the Cup will commence in Saturday’s Cloudsoft Accounting and Tax Advisors (1400m) at Ruakaka, where Mahrajaan has enjoyed a week preparing on the sunny beaches in the north.
“He loves getting out on the beach, he’s got Nereus as his sidekick this time around,” Ritchie said.
“He does take all of the two miles to get to his best as he’s proven in the past, in fact I think his form is duck-egg, win, duck-egg, duck-egg, win.
“So, he’s unlikely to be competitive on Saturday and he’s still got half of his winter coat, which I think is a bit of an English thing with the cold winters up there. Hopefully with the sun on his back up here and a run on Saturday will bring that through.
“He’s on a Melbourne Cup campaign and we’re not expecting him to get to his best until he gets to a mile-and-a-half at least, so he’ll get back and run on. If he can pick up a couple that would be nice, but if he follows them around so be it.”
Mahrajaan’s classy stablemate Nereus (NZ) (Savabeel) will kick-off his campaign in the race, after a rapid rise through the grades in the second-half of last season.
Nereus won four races including the Gr.2 Awapuni Gold Cup (2100m) and placed in the Remutaka Classic (2100m), with his campaign culminating in a creditable sixth in the Listed Mornington Cup (2400m) in Victoria.
Ritchie said the son of Savabeel would also use the race as a springboard onto further distance targets, but his class places him in the mix at sprint range.
“Nereus has got a nice enough turn of foot, he’s a sharp enough horse to be competitive first-up as a stayer but obviously his targets are not this Saturday either,” he said.
“Neither of them have had trials so they aren’t tuned up for this race, but they did have an exhibition gallop at Cambridge last week.
“I expect them both to hit the line strongly, then we’ll look for some further distances.”
Bred and raced by Waikato Stud, Nereus has been nominated for both the Gr.1 Arrowfield Stud Plate (1600m) and Gr.1 Livamol Classic (2050m) during the Hawke’s Bay Spring Carnival, while a trip across the Tasman is also up for discussion.
“It sounds like a good lunch over a few red wines with Mark Chittick (owner) to sort out where he may go, but last time we spoke, Melbourne was certainly on the cards,” Ritchie said.
“We thought we would see how he performed in his first couple of runs back in, he’ll advance from a 1400m to a mile and then a run over ground.
“He’s in a position where we can probably avoid those Group Ones and stay in handicaps, he’s carried 59 and 60 kilos to success at Trentham last year so the weight, despite the fact he’s not the biggest horse, doesn’t seem to bother him.
“If we can work his rating up a little bit, we may have a crack at Melbourne.”
