Top Savabeel colt delivers

The regally-bred Scrutizine will head to the central districts with his unbeaten record intact following his tidy victory at Ruakaka this afternoon. The WS graduate settled at the back of a small field and he finished too well down the outside under rider Matt Cameron.

A debut winner at Matamata in his sole autumn outing, the Savabeel three-year-old is a son of the dual Group One winner Legs. “For a horse I bought to win a Derby to win over 1200 metres was a big bonus,” Te Akau principal David Ellis said. “He’s an exciting colt and he will go to the Hawke’s Bay Guineas and then the Canterbury Stakes before the 2000 Guineas.”

Ellis purchased Scrutizine out of WS’s 2014 Premier Sale consignment to Karaka for $200,000. He is a half-brother to Wolfwhistle (O’Reilly), who is the stakes winner of five races for Te Akau, and the multiple winner Lego (O’Reilly).