King rules at Kembla
The addition of headgear at Kembla Grange on Saturday afternoon paved the way for King Of Thunder to crown the fast start he has made to his career.
The John O’Shea and Tom Charlton-prepared three-year-old had placed in both of his previous appearances and he made no mistake this time, thumping his rivals over 1600 metres.
Rider Andrew Adkins took any bad luck out of the equation by making the running aboard the hot favourite and they cruised clear in the straight for an effortless five and a-half length
victory.
“His first two runs were really good and the blinkers helped to sharpen him up,” Charlton
said.
“We like him and think he’s a horse that will get over further later on.”
Bred by Pippa Chittick, the son of former resident sire Tivaci, King Of Thunder was sold by Waikato Stud through Ohukia Lodge’s New Zealand Bloodstock Ready to Run Sale draft to O’Shea for $50,000.
He is out of the stakes-placed Zabeel mare Sheezababe, who produced a sister to King Of Tunder last season and is due to foal to Ardrossan.
She has now left four winners, including the G1 Vinery Stud Stakes placegetter Impecunious, and is a daughter of the G1 Sydney Cup winner Honour Babe.
Oilman’s stud stake could change course of NZ breeding
Eighteen months ago, Texas oilman Nelson Bunker Hunt walked through the lush Waikato pasture of Matamata’s Balcarres Stud and announced he wanted some just like it for his own.
Today he has-360 acres about a mile down the road which has been transformed from a dairy farm to one of New Zealand’s leading horse and cattle breeding establishments.
Read More
WS graduate Honour Roll out to add stakes success at Otaki
Waikato Stud will be cheering on one of its promising graduates on Friday when Honour Roll contests the Listed John Turkington Forestry Castletown Stakes (1200m) at Otaki. The WS-bred son of the late Champion sire …
Read More