Sagunto goes all the way at Awapuni

Sagunto bounced back to his front-running best at Awapuni to comfortably bag the fifth victory of his career.

The O’Reilly six-year-old had been a commanding winner during the Hawke’s Bay carnival before he came unstuck on a rain-affected track at Te Rapa and he relished the better ground this afternoon.

Rider Shaun McKay let the Waikato Stud-bred and sold gelding roll along at the head of affairs before putting the pressure on 600 metres from and stayed on strongly to score over 2000 metres.

Sagunto is raced by McKay’s parents Peter, who also does the training, and Kim and was a $120,000 New Zealand Bloodstock Yearling Sale purchase.

He is out of the Listed Northland Breeders’ S. winner Queen Sabeel, who has produced four winners and foaled a filly last year by Sacred Falls.

Waikato Stud was also involved in an earlier winner on the Awapuni card as co-breeder with the Forbes family, who race the Kevin Gray-trained Stumpy.

Also a son of the late O’Reilly, he too is a five-time winner after accounting for his open handicap rivals over 1400 metres. 

Stumpy is out of Stravinskys Affair, also the dam of the six-time winner and multiple black-type placegetter Rock ‘N’ Affair.