Super Success in Singapore

The Ready to Run Sale’s superb weekend was capped in Singapore with the triumph of Super Ninetyseven (Show a Heart) in the Sgp-1 S$500,000 Raffles Cup WFA (1800m) at Kranji on Sunday.

Super Ninetyseven winning the Sgp-1 Raffles Cup WFA at Kranji. Photo Courtesy of STC.

The victory at the elite level in Singapore followed a Group 2 win by Savvy Nature (NZ) (Savabeel) in Australia and a Listed win by Atlante (Fastnet Rock) in New Zealand, both on Saturday.

Super Ninetyseven gained a deserved victory in the Singapore Group 1 event after finishing runner-up to race rival Stepitup earlier this year. The four-year-old won a Group 3 event two starts ago and was stepping up to 1800 for the first time.

The favourite in the race was fellow Karaka graduate War Affair (NZ) (O’Reilly) who had swept all before him as a three-year-old and took on the older horses for the first time.

The Michael Freedman trained Super Ninetyseven settled near the rear of the field for jockey Alan Munro. The pair got onto the back of War Affair as they improved into the race entering the home straight.

It was War Affair that ran to the front with 300m to go but Super Ninetyseven unleashed a strong sprint that proved too powerful for his younger competitor as the son of Show a Heart was victorious by 1.5 lengths over War Affair.

Sunday’s race was the second leg of Singapore’s Triple Crown Series with the third leg, the Group 1 Singapore Gold Cup over 2200m, looking likely as the horse’s next start.

“The Joy N Happiness Stable were pretty happy with the victory,” said Super Ninetyseven’s trainer Michael Freedman. “He was a bit unlucky in a couple of starts earlier in the year so they were very happy for him to win his first Group 1.”

“I recommended the horse to the owners two years ago at the Sale and they went and bid on him. He didn’t jump off the page with the way he breezed up but he just looked like a nice athletic type of horse that we thought was worth the purchase.

“He is a very genuine, consistent horse that has obviously come along in leaps and bounds over the last 12 months and hopefully he holds together and might be a Derby-type horse next year.

 “I will be in New Zealand at the Ready to Run next month - I haven’t spoken to the owners if they will be going but I go every year and will be there again this year.”

It was the seventh win from 13 starts for Super Ninetyseven, his second at black-type level, along with four minor placings. He carries the same colours as Super Easy under the ownership of the Joy N Happiness Stable, earning them S$787,095 in prizemoney.

Bred by Mr G Goon, Super Ninetyseven is out of Zabeel mare Yabeel, the dam of six winners including the stakes placed Wabeel (Commands). He was purchased by Ms Foo Oi Ling for  at the 2011 Ready to Run Sale from Lyndhurst Park.

Lyndhurst Farm has been the leading vendor at the Ready to Run Sale for the past eight years and have 21 Lots catalogued in this year’s Sale.

For catalogues, Breeze Up DVDs, and sale information from NZB visit www.nzb.co.nz.