Another Gem For O’Reilly

WS’s champion resident O’Reilly received another boost in the lead in to NZ Bloodstock’s National Sales series with further stakes success at Trentham on Saturday. In a clean sweep for the Matamata farm, his homebred daughter High Fashion got in the deciding stride to down Savabeel filly Soriano in the Gr 3 Desert Gold Stakes.

It was an emotional result for trainer Kevin Gray, who has enjoyed a long and successful association with the Chittick family, with former apprentice Hayden Tinsley his winning jockey. It had been Gray’s Singapore-based son Stephen who had signed for $30,000 for High Fashion, who will now focus on the Gr 1 New Zealand Oaks, when bought out of WS’s 2011 Premier Sale draft.

The filly is out of the former smart Pins racemare Pin High who won three races and was stakes placed. She is a half-sister to the Gr 2 Waikato Gold Cup winner Ultimate Aim (Centaine) who was also Gr 1 placed in the Auckland and Wellington Cups.

O’Reilly also went close to a notable Trentham double when Annie Higgins was narrowly denied victory in the Gr 2 Wellington Cup. This season’s Gr 3 Waikato Gold Cup winner went down by a slender margin to the dual Gr 2 New Zealand Cup winner Blood Brotha.