Stakes winner No. 17 for Al Maher

Al Maher’s high-class daughter Cabernet scored a very well deserved maiden stakes victory when winning a competitive renewal of the Listed MRC Summoned Stakes on the final day of the 2012 Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival at Sandown.

Already a stakes placed winner of five metropolitan races in Sydney before her latest engagement, the 6-year-old daughter of Al Maher was seen at her very best in winning the Summoned Stakes in authoritative fashion. Positioned just off the pace in the back straight of the 1500m contest, Cabernet carried herself to the lead with just over a furlong to race before holding off her opposition with the minimum of fuss over the closing stages.

Cabernet’s three-quarters of a length victory took her earnings to more than $350,000 in a very good career that will now see her aimed at the Group 2 ATC Villiers Stakes (1600m) staged at Warwick Farm just before Christmas.

In winning the Summoned Stakes, Cabernet became the 17th stakes winner of Al Maher’s stud career and the 11th to come from the Emirates Park stallion’s very first foal crop. She is the first stakes winner produced by the Nine Carat (USA) mare Golden Weekend, herself a black-type winner of the Listed STC Triscay Stakes. Golden Weekend is back in foal to Al Maher.

Cabernet became the fourth individual stakes winner for Al Maher since the beginning of the 2012/13 racing season following the black-type victories of Fat Al (Epsom Hcp.-G1), Oasis Bloom and All Legal.

First winner for Eavesdropper

Eavesdropper (USA) is off the mark as a winning sire in Australia following the impressive success of Downton Abbey at the Wellington meeting staged last Saturday.

A member of Eavesdropper’s first crop bred in Australia, Downton Abbey produced a powerful late finish over the final 250 metres to claim the 900-metre contest after being at least half-a-dozen lengths in arrears of the leaders on the home turn. The chestnut filly scored by close to two lengths in a tick over 54 seconds when storming home to record the breed’s first success in Australia.

Downton Abbey was bred and sold by Emirates Park. She is one of four starters for Eavesdropper since the beginning of the new juvenile racing season and the second to earn prizemoney. Dropper Crystal finished third in the Tamworth Romantic Dream Plate — the first 2-year-old event held in NSW in 2012/13.

Connections of Downton Abbey confirmed immediately after her victory that the filly would be sent for a spell before being set for the prestigious Wellington Boot later in the season. Eavesdropper served his first local season at Emirates Park, Murrurundi, in 2009 after initially commencing his stud career in North America. His US-bred stock feature no fewer than 79 individual winners of more than 200 races worldwide.

For further information contact:-
Bryan Carlson 0415 275 885
Trevor Lobb 0418 240 230
Peter Boyle 0427 459 795