Shamus Award racks up another top-level win in Australian
Guineas
Shamus Award has won just twice
in 12 starts, but he knows how to win when it counts. The
Snitzel three-year-old made history in October by becoming the first horse to
break his maiden in the Group 1 Cox Plate, and on Saturday added his second lifetime score in Flemington’s Group 1 Australian
Guineas.
Bounding to the lead from the start as he did in the Cox
Plate, Shamus Award carved out strong fractions while racing
keenly under jockey Craig Williams. Kicking clear at the top of the
lane, Shamus Award comfortably held off a fast-finishing Criterion and Thunder Fantasy to win
by a length.
Favored Hucklebuck made up ground late
after meeting traffic trouble at the top of the lane, but could manage only eighth.
Trainer Danny O’Brien suggested Shamus Award could back up in next week’s
Group 1, A$1 million Australian Cup.
“We really wanted to come and win this,” O’Brien told Racing and Sports.
“He’s done what very few three-year-olds have done — win a Cox Plate — and to
back it up with a Guineas, it puts him in very rare air.
“This was his big one but certainly we have the option next week of the
Australian Cup, or then wait two weeks to the (Group 2) Alister Clark. There’s
only two races to get us to Sydney, and that would be the (Group 1) Rosehill
Guineas (on March 29) and the (Group 1, A$4 million) Queen Elizabeth (Stakes at
The Championships on April 19).”
An A$230,000 Inglis Easter yearling of 2012, Shamus
Award was clearly well-regarded from the beginning. He made just one start in maiden
company, finishing third in October 2012, before being thrust into stakes competition. He
finished third in both the Group 3 Maribyrnong Plate and the listed Chairman’s Stakes before a
fifth in the Group 1 Blue Diamond Stakes.
Shamus Award checked in second in the Group 2 Henry Bucks Sires’ Produce
Stakes
to wrap up his two-year-old campaign, and resurfaced with a runner-up effort in Moonee
Valley’s Group 2 McKenzie Stakes last August. Off the board in the listed Best Dressed Stakes, he
finished second by a short head in the Group 2 Bill Stutt Stakes prior to his second shot at the highest
level in the Group 1 Caulfield Guineas, where he claimed third.
Drawing into the October 26 Cox Plate as a result of the late withdrawal of
favored Atlantic Jewel, Shamus Award rode the rails to a shocking victory under
17-year-old apprentice Chad Schofield, besting the likes of Fiorente, It’s a Dundeel, Long John and Puissance de Lune.
Shamus Award failed to show the fire of that victory first up in the Group 1 C.F. Orr
Stakes three weeks ago, lugging in in deep stretch to manage only third behind Moment of Change, but he justified his Cox Plate victory
on Saturday.
“At the end of the day he beat all those horses in the Cox Plate,” O’Brien
told RacingNetwork.com.au. “We will have a serious think about it. I can’t see
any reason why he has anything to fear from them next week (in the Australian
Cup).”
O’Brien confirmed that Shamus Award will race on as a four-year-old with an
eye to a second Cox Plate.
“It’s not often you get a chance to win a second one as a four-year-old,” the
conditioner said. “We saw So You Think do it, and we’d be keen to be back there
later in the year.”
Also in Australia on Saturday, Mossfun kept her perfect record intact and
boosted her credentials for the Group 1 Golden Slipper, the world’s richest juvenile race, with a dominant
score in the Group 2 Silver Slipper at Rosehill.
Attending the pace a half-length to the outside of the front-running Breeders’ Plate winner Law, Mossfun sprinted past Law when given the cue
by jockey J.B. McDonald approaching the 200-meter mark, and was
well clear at the line.
“I’ve always loved this filly, and she smashed them,” co-trainer
Michael Hawkes told Racing and Sports. “From day one she just kept improving. Some people
underrated her on the (maiden) win, but she is exposed now.
The Mossman filly was shelved after breaking her December 14 maiden at Randwick, and
resurfaced in the Group 3 Widden Stakes at Rosehill two weeks ago, scoring by a
cozy length.
“There is no decision on
whether she will have another start before the (April 5) Slipper,” Hawkes added.
“She may go straight there. She is an
athlete and may not need to run again.”
Mossfun was promoted to second choice for the A$4
million Golden Slipper behind Group 1 Blue Diamond winner Earthquake.
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