Experience accounts for youth

5 December 2013

Veteran Telecom Top Star upstaged his younger rivals at Happy Valley last night for the fourth win of his career. The WS graduate has now won three times in Hong Kong after breaking his maiden as a three-year-old in New Zealand where he raced as Tele Combo.

The son of O’Reilly was an $80,000 yearling at Karaka and is out of the Centaine mare Corsica. She is a half-sister to the stakes winner River Chant (Danasinga) and a three-quarter sister to the dam of the dual Australian black type winner Marquardt.

Corsica was unraced but she has been a good producer and Telecom Top Star’s younger sister Hera promises to continue to add to the family record. In a brief career for trainer Roger James she was won three races, including the Listed Great Northern Foal Stakes, and finished runner-up in the Listed Trevor Eagle Memorial.

Oaks Day glory for Waikato Stud-bred Sulek

Waikato Stud enjoyed a special moment on Oaks Day at Flemington on Thursday, when the New Zealand-bred gelding Sulek – by Super Seth out the O’Reilly mare Tiff And Co, saluted on one of the biggest days of the racing calendar and in front of an international crowd. Bred by the farm in partnership with the Dowager Duchess of Bedford, Sulek took out the A$500,000 Cirka Melbourne Cup Carnival Country Final (1600m) for the third and most lucrative win of his career.

5 November 2026

The Corner with Garry Chittick

And so, another Melbourne Cup has been run. Regretfully, Mary and I were not there. I have no idea how many we attended up until COVID, and I miss the Cup week. Victoria prides itself as the sporting capital of Australia; it may be, they certainly know how to create an event.