Veteran teaches youngsters a winning lesson

4 August 2013

Veteran performer Natsinga gave age and a beating to his Rating 85 rivals at Ruakaka on Saturday for the seventh win of his career. The nine-year-old had put the writing on the wall of an imminent return to top form when a fast-finishing fifth in the Whangarei Cup at his previous appearance.

Bred by Garry Chittick, the Danasinga gelding was a $44,000 purchase out of WS’s Premier Sale draft to Karaka in 2006 and he has now returned more than $145,000 to his connections. He is out of the former Gr 3 Cornwall Handicap winner Nat The Brat and a half-brother to three winners, including the stakes performer Vera Pro Gratis (O’Reilly) and the dam of the Listed Wanganui Guineas winner Takeanotherchance (No Excuse Needed).

Natsinga is trained at Matamata by Lance Noble and was ridden by Trudy Thornton. They settled off the early pace and came with a well-timed run to down the favourite King Zeus, five years the junior of the winner.

Tivaci’s Movie Night steals the show at Newcastle

A sister to the Gr.1 ATC Flight Stakes (1600m) winner Never Been Kissed, the Waikato Stud-bred and raced Movie Night (NZ) was rewarded for her consistency, breaking her maiden with an all-the-way win over 1400m at Newcastle for trainer Tom Charlton.

9 July 2026

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.