Mornington based trainers Amy and Ash Yargi have a runner at Flemington on Saturday, but they will also be keeping a close eye on the action in Darwin.
The husband and wife team will be represented by three-year-old gelding Zoomurudi and five-year-old gelding Holster at Fannie Bay on Day 1 of the 2022 Darwin Cup Carnival.
The eight race meeting extravaganza concludes with the $200,000 Great Northern Darwin Cup (2050m) on August 1.
Both horses will be making their debuts in the Top End on Saturday, with Darwin trainer Patrick Johnston – Amy’s brother – having cared for the pair once they arrived in the Northern Territory.
Zoomurudi will line up in the $75,000 Darwin Guineas (1600m), while Holster will feature against open company in the $24,000 Sprout Creative Handicap (1600m) – the opening event on the nine-race card.
Victorian jockey Jason Maskiell, who won the $100,000 Pioneer Sprint (1200m) in Alice Springs on May 1 aboard Smuggling for Darwin trainer Phil Cole, has made the trip north to ride both horses.
“We’ve sent two horses up for our first Darwin Cup Carnival, so it’s a bit exciting,” Amy said on Friday.
“We’re coming up for the week of the NT Derby (July 16).
“We’ve got Florescent Star in a Listed race at Flemington tomorrow, so we’re staying down here for that.
“My brother Pat Johnston has been doing a wonderful job taking care of the horses for us in our absence.
“We’re talking three or four times a day – they’ve travelled up really well and they’re both in really good order.”
Florescent Star, a four-year-old mare, lines up in the $160,000 Furphy Santa Ana Lane Sprint Series Final (1200m) at Flemington.
As fate would have it Florescent Star will confront former Northern Territory star Savatoxl, who has excelled regularly on the big stage with victory in last year’s Group 1 Goodwood Handicap (1200m) at Morphettville in Adelaide appearing on his CV.
“Zoomurudi, his main aim the whole time through is the NT Derby,” Yargi said.
“We’re hoping that we can win a couple of races on the way through and then Holster would run in the Darwin Cup as well.”
Zoomurudi has had just three career starts, so to win the Darwin Guineas would be a remarkable.
A second over 1600m on debut in a Goulburn maiden on October 31 for prominent trainers Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bolt was followed by a ninth in a 2000m maiden in Canberra on November 14.
He then ended up with the Yargis at their Victorian base before making his return on June 7 where he finished second in a 1600m maiden on the synthetic surface at Pakenham.
“He’s really primed for it (the Guineas),” Yargi said.
“I do think that he’s going to be at his best once he gets up over 2000m, but he’s taken some really nice form from down south up there.
“His first run for us when he ran second the other day at Pakenham was really good.
“We were really hoping that he won that and then it would make it a little bit easier to get a run in the Guineas, but we’ve ended up getting a run no problem any way.
“I’d be expecting him to just get back just a little bit – the pace is always good in those sort of races up there, so I’d also be expecting him to be flashing home late really fast.”
Holster started out with the Michael, Wayne and John Hawkes stable before finding his way to the Yargi yard in late 2020, and in 19 starts he has had three wins from 1400-1862m.
He broke his duck with victory in a 1615m maiden at Werribee in December 2020 before prevailing on the Pakenham synthetic over 1400m (Class 1) in August last year and on a heavy track at Kyneton over 1862m (0-64) on November 3.
In his last appearance, Holster finished six lengths adrift in eighth place in the Elmore Cup (1600m) for the 0-70 class at Bendigo on June 4.
If Yargi is bullish about Zoomurudi making an impact in the three-year-old features, then she feels Holster could make a statement in the Darwin Cup.
“His form down here is pretty good – he’s always worked like a city class horse in Melbourne.” she said.
“This time of year we’ve got a lot of wet tracks – he does like the dirt and synthetic surfaces, so we felt like he’d be really well placed up there.
“He seems to be thriving and enjoys the warmer weather, so it looks like a nice suitable race tomorrow – we’d be hoping that he’d win that and then it would make our lives easier to get a run in the Cup.”
Should Holster run well on Saturday, Yargi wasn’t sure if he would race again with the Darwin Cup in mind.
“Potentially, but we just want to see how he goes first and then see if we would run him over the 2050m or over a mile again before the Cup,” she said.
“Tomorrow, we’ll know more as to how he likes that sort of surface, the tempo, and how he copes with Top End racing, and then we can make an educated assessment from there.
“There’s no shortage of options such as the Bridge Toyota Cup, Chief Ministers Cup, Metric Mile and Buntine Handicap.
“We’ll just wait and see whether we would have another run over a mile and then go to the 2050m in the Cup – or which way we go, so we’ll just see how he goes tomorrow.
“We’d be expecting him to be pretty hard to beat – everything being fair and equal.”
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