Flamingo flies home on debut

28 March 2017

Flamingo

Flamingo had little more than a working gallop to deliver a perfect debut performance at Waipukurau last week. The Mark Chittick-bred and owned daughter of Pins came from the back of the field to win at the first time of asking.

“We haven’t put a lot of pressure on her yet and from her work we were pretty confident,” said Emma Haworth, who trains the filly with her father David. “it’s really pleasing and we’ve always thought a lot of her.

Flamingo settled toward the tail of the field and she finished well down the outside under a soft ride from Sam Weatherley. “She got squeezed up out of the gates, but she was always travelling well and she had it won a long way out,” he said.

She is a daughter of the Danasinga mare Bird, who won two races for Chittick and the Haworths, including the Listed Warstep Stakes. She is from the family of the multiple Group winners Chintz and Irlanda.

Ardrossan’s Group 1-placed darling wins A$300,000 Gr.2 HKJC World Pool Wakeful Stakes

Second and fourth in 1600m Group 1 races in her two previous starts since being purchased privately by OTI Racing and stepping out in Australia under Chris Waller’s racing banner, De Armas (Ardrossan) stepped up in distance at Flemington on Saturday and opened her Australian account in style in the A$300,000 Gr.2 HKJC World Pool Wakeful Stakes (2000m) on Derby Day.

30 October 2026

The Corner with Garry Chittick

The writing of my Corner started many years ago, motivated by an irritation that I felt needed scratching. It was never my intention to make my commentary regular; neither did I intend to reinvent the direction of racing administration. It is both disappointing and ironical that what should be a simple, straightforward business provides a regular need for comment.