Quality mare Polly Grey (NZ) (Azamour) will be given the opportunity to boost her future broodmare value and attain millionaire status during a brief homecoming.
The New Zealand-bred mare will depart from her adopted home in Sydney on Wednesday for a one-off crack at the Gr.1 Cambridge Stud Zabeel Classic (2000m) at Pukekohe on Boxing Day.
The well-related daughter of Azamour is a stakes winner on both sides of the Tasman and elite-level success would crown the terrific ride the mare has given her connections, which includes her former trainer Kylie Fawcett.
“She is just coming over for the Zabeel Classic, there’s not really anything else for her so we’re giving it a go,” the Matamata-based horsewoman said.
“We’ve been keeping an eye on the weather and ideally we would like quite a rain-affected track.”
The winner of more than NZ$960,000, Polly Grey’s 11 career victories have all been posted on soft or heavy ground, but the eight-year-old isn’t totally one-dimensional.
“She still has run very well on better tracks in Australia without winning. She has been right there a number of times,” Fawcett said.
She prepared Polly Grey to win six races, including the Listed Matamata Cup (1600m) and placed in both the Gr.2 Japan Trophy (1600m) and the Gr.3 Thompson Handicap (1600m).
In her subsequent Australian career with champion trainer Chris Waller, she has been the dual Group Three winner of the Epona Handicap (1900m) and the Japan Racing Association Plate (2000m).
Polly Grey has also claimed the Listed Gosford Cup (2100m), Listed Lord Mayor’s Cup (2000m) and the Listed ATC Cup (2000m) and posted multiple black-type placings.
“She has been terrific, she’s been an absolute gem for us,” Fawcett said.
Polly Grey has run three times this campaign and finished a first-up fourth in the Gr.3 Angst Stakes (1600m) and was then seventh in the Gr.2 Matriarch Stakes (2000m) before an unplaced effort in the Gr.2 The Ingham (1600m).
“She’ll go back after the Zabeel and get ready for one more prep in the autumn and hopefully through to Brisbane before she goes to the broodmare paddock,” Fawcett said.
“We are going to keep her and get her in foal. That’s why we have raced her on a bit as we’re going to breed to race.
“Initially, we will probably send her to a stallion in Australia and then bring her back here in foal.
“We were tossing up getting her in foal last season and we looked at a couple of stallions, but decided to race on.”
The mare is a daughter of the Zenno Rob Roy mare Allanah (NZ), who was successful on four occasions, and she is a half-sister to the Gr.1 Easter Handicap (1600m) winner Pasta Post (NZ) (Postponed) and the Gr.3 Hawke’s Bay Gold Cup winner Dom Domingo (NZ) (Pag-Asa) (2200m).
Polly Grey’s hit and run Group One mission aside, Fawcett will be enjoying a quieter Christmas racing period.
“I won’t be having any runners, all my racing team are in the paddock and I’ve just got a handful of young ones coming up,” she said.