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2016 Sunline Trust Scholarships

For further information, click here - Nicola Griffiths...

New Zealand Racing mourns passing of Hall Of Fame trainer

The New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing Industry is mourning the passing of legendary Australian trainer Bart Cummings. The extraordinary horseman who was known worldwide as the "Melbourne Cup King" passed away peacefully on the weekend after accomplishing virtually all there was to accomplish in the world of thoroughbred horse racing. Celebrated for his many career achievements in Australia, his deeds with New Zealand bred horses were recognised locally in 2012 when he was made an honorary induct...

Health and Safety Workshops 2015

From 28 September a number of health and safety workshops will be held for all Race Clubs, Trainers, Jockeys and Breeders. The purpose of these workshops is to finalise draft templates that will assist Clubs in preparing their health and safety plans and provide advice to Trainers, Jockeys and Breeders . Please advise numbers attending by Friday, 4 September – please RSVP to office@nzracing.co.nz Final confirmation and details will be provided to all attendees by Friday, ...

IDL Breeding, Parfore & Waikato Stud win Breeding Awards

Waikato Stud, IDL Breeding & wonder broodmare Parfore received the breeding industry's highest honours at the New Zealand Thoroughbred Horse of the Year Awards held on Thursday evening in Hamilton. The Awards celebrated an outstanding 2014-15 season for Kiwi-bred horses and New Zealand breeders, owners, trainers & jockeys in domestic & international comeptition. Dominic Li's IDL Breeding Ltd won the coveted Breeder of the Year title after breeding Australian Group 1 winners Volks...

2015 Auckland & Breeding & Racing Awards, 26 September

Breeders of three Group 1 winners are among the long list of NZTBA Auckland branch members to be honoured at this year's Auckland Breeding & Racing Awards dinner on Saturday 26 September to be held at the beautiful Villa Maria Estate (pictured). Local trainers, jockeys & owners will also be recognised and elite performers such as Rosehill Guineas winner Volkstok'n'barrell are in the mix for the 2015 Auckland Horse of the Year title. Once again sponsored by New Zealand Bloodstock Insur...

Studmaster Branch President reports a notable year

The 2014-15 season has once again been a successful one for the New Zealand-bred horses. In total there have been 12 international Group One races won outside New Zealand, as well as three Singapore Group One events. The four different countries where these were won are important export markets for our horses: Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore & Japan. One of the highlights of last season must be, for the second year running, The Championships at Royal Randwick where our horses played a major...

NZTBA Waikato branch honours Group 1 breeders

Aerovelocity has earned international honours for his sprinting prowess and the New Zealand-bred has also been acknowledged on the domestic front. Trained by expatriate Kiwi horseman Paul O'Sullivan, the Pins gelding has Group One victories in three countries to his credit with the Chukyo Takamatsunomiya Kinen in Japan and the Krisflyer Sprint in Singapore to go with his Longines Hong Kong Sprint success. Aerovelocity was recently honoured as the Waikato branch of the NZ Thoroughbred Breeders'...

Benji’s Blog – August 2015

From Ireland to America The Prestigious Royal Ascot Racing Carnival Whilst at Coolmore Stud, Ireland I was fortunate enough to spend a fortnight at one of the most successful training yards in the world 'Ballydoyle', Ireland. My experience at Ballydoyle over the Royal Ascot carnival was unforgettable! The quality of the horses heading over to Royal Ascot, England and the racing over the five day carnival was truly amazing. Top horses travel from all over the world: Ireland, France, Americ...

Last call for entries for the 2015 NZB Insurance Pearl Bonus Scheme

Entries for the 2015 NZB Insurance Pearl Bonus Scheme close tomorrow, 31st July 2015. A one off entry fee of 920.00 (inc. GST) gives your yearling filly eligibility for bonuses as a 2YO, 3YO and 4YO. Enter your yearling filly online by visiting the NZTBA website or call Nicola on (07) 827 7727. - Nicola Griffiths...

Newly Appointed NZTBA Council

The NZTBA's Annual General Meeting was held last Tuesday 21st July in Cambridge. Elections were held for the new Council following the retirement of John 'O'Brien and Murray Brenton-Rule, both from the Central Region. We are delighted to welcome two new Central Region Councillors, Libby Bleakley and Jo Griffin. John Fokerd was re-elected as President and Treasurer and Mark Chitty re-elected as Vice President. John Thompson, John Fokerd, Vicki Pascoe and Mark Chitty remain as the Executive Comm...

Nominees for next month's NZ Thoroughbred Racing and Breeding Awards

Waikato Stud will again be in the thick of the action when the 2015 New Zealand Thoroughbred Racing Award winners are honoured in Hamilton next month. Their leading sire Savabeel will be crowned with both the Grosvenor Award and the Dewar Stallion Trophy on August 13 while his late associate sire O'Reilly or current resident Pins will win the Centaine Award. Stud patriarch Garry Chittick is also nominated for the Breeder of the Year Award for the Group One deeds of the farm graduates Sacred Fa...

Karaka Stallion Parade on 31 July, 2015

The Karaka Stallion Parade will be held for the third time at New Zealand Bloodstock prior to the commencement of the Winter Mixed Bloodstock Sale at 12pm on Friday 31 July. With the new breeding season just around the corner, studmasters are offered the opportunity to parade their sires, young or established, at the Karaka Sales Complex. Amongst the stallions schedule to visit Karaka this year are El Roca, Proisir and Little Wonder, three sires commencing their first season at stud this year...

Lightning Doesn't Strike Twice in the Same Place

Dubbed "The Chestnut Thunderbolt" and the undisputed champion of his time, Mainbrace played a significant role in the direction and development of the New Zealand breeding industry. His bloodlines set a trend that was to last for several decades, all in the name of attempting to breed the next Mainbrace. There is a wise old saying, however, that lightning does not strike twice in the same place and in the case of replicating Mainbrace, that appears to be true despite the many efforts to dispro...

Vale Melba Murfitt

New Zealand owner and breeder Melba Murfitt has died aged 94. Christchurch-based Murfitt bred and raced the Roger James-trained Gr.1 New Zealand Stakes winner Gaze, along with her Group One performing dam Eye Full. Along with her late husband Mick, Murfitt ran Riccarton Stud where they stood stallions such as Treasure Hunt, Ribotlight, and Palatable, the sire of Eye Full. Murfitt attributed her longevity to her interest in horses, with the Murfitts' involvement dating back to the mid 1950s. ...

Savaria and the history of her ancestry

Following the success of Savaria, the 2015 group one New Zealand Oaks winner, much has been said about her ancestress Princess Patine, the fabulous foundation mare of the Moore family's Soliloquy Lodge. Princess Patine's sire, Pakistan II(GB), may well have provided the spark that ignited almost 50 years of unabated success yet there was another stallion, the great Sobig, by Summertime(GB), who provided the fuel and who, coincidentally, lived less than a kilometre from Pakistan II in Longburn, ...

Dylan's Blog – July 2015

The long goodbye Over the past month things have really wound down at the stud. The mares are now all pregnant and living out in the paddocks with their young ones, grazing and enjoying the sun. The stallions have slowed down almost to a stop with only 1 or 2 covers a day and Americain is getting ready to head back down south as well. With the stud slowing down, it has opened up time for us students to go on more field trips. It was great to get the opportunity to see so many different studs,...

Zabeel continues his impressive status as a broodmare sire

Pencarrow Stud were one of the original shareholders in the mighty Cambridge Stud stallion Zabeel and what a wonderful investment that has turned out to be. In an earlier interview with the NZTBA, Leon Casey Pencarrow's manager, described Zabeel's blood as gold and stated that he is a unique horse, who put range, scope and stamina into his foals, and now his mares are producing some great crosses with some great stallions. Already Zabeel has been the champion broodmare sire in Australia and N...

Close finish in broodmare sires' race

A photo-finish is looming in the New Zealand broodmare sires' premiership with former Waikato Stud stalwarts Centaine and O'Reilly locked in a tight tussle. Centaine currently leads the standings with earnings of $2,264,172, chiefly through the feats of New Zealand Derby winner Mongolian Khan. But close behind on $2,238,762 is O'Reilly, whose dual Group One-winning son Sacred Star has been his best performer. Zabeel, who has won the title for the past three seasons, sits in third spot on $1,7...

The "Rose" dynasty of Rosehill Farm continues

In 1924 a breeder in Te Awamutu acquired a filly by Wairiki from Miss Rose that he named Wee Rose, and therein started the "Rose" dynasty of Rosehill Farm, that is still producing Stakes winners some 90 years later. That breeder Bill Alexander was the maternal uncle of one Joe Pollard, whose daughter Liz still runs Rosehill Farm and bred and raced its latest Stakes winner Queens Rose (O'Reilly – Rosetti Bay). Queens Rose recently won the Listed Tauranga Classic for fillies and mares, and in ...

Benji’s Blog – June 2015

COOLMORE STUD, IRELAND Prospect Foaling Yard After arriving at Coolmore Stud I started my placement at Prospect foaling yard. Since it was getting late in the season there were only 24 mares left to foal I had not long been in the house when I got the call from Mick the yard manager at around 10.30 pm asking if I would like to see a foaling. The foaling procedure was very similar to that at Cheveley Park, the mares foal inside on a big box of straw and assisted. When the mare breaks water t...

Hawke's Bay Foal Walk and lunch this Sunday

The Hawke's Bay/Poverty Bay branch will be holding their foal walk and lunch this Sunday 28th June 2015 commencing at 10.30am. It will start with Guy Lowry in Kawera Road, Okawa then on to Lime Country Thoroughbreds at Okawa Stud. This will be followed by a visit to Barry Smyth's property in Crystall Road, Havelock. The final stop will be with Gerard Moughan, 306 St Georges Road, Havelock North. Lunch will be at "Off the Track" restaurant on Havelock Road. Reservations are necessary. Please ...

2015 NZTBA Stallion Register now available

This is the time of the year that all thoroughbred breeders look forward too, as it's when the NZTBA publish their stallion register. Yes folks that's right, the 42nd volume of the Register of Thoroughbred Stallions of New Zealand is in the letter boxes of all financial members of the NZTBA. The 160 page book features the tabulated pedigrees of 89 stallions standing at stud in New Zealand along with their race and stud records and the statistics of their sires. It is crammed full of statistica...

Vale Phil Bayly

New Zealand has lost one of its most successful breeders and owners with the recent passing of Phil Bayly. He was 92. His familiar red and black stripe silks were carried to Group One successes on both sides of the Tasman by such outstanding gallopers as (My) Blue Denim, Eagle Eye, Harris Tweed and the ill-fated Lion Tamer. A sheep and cattle farmer at Kai Iwi, near Wanganui, for 40 years before his move north to Cambridge and then Tauranga, he hailed from a racing family and his uncle Horace ...

NZTR Chairman to not seek re-election

Click here to view the Press Release....

2015 Bayer Lecture Series - Equine Back Pain

The New Zealand Equine Research Foundation is pleased to be able to introduce Dr Sarah le Jeune as the speaker for this year's Bayer Lecture Series. Dr le Jeune is the chief of Equine Integrative Sports Medicine Service at the University of California Davis and specialises in the diagnosis and treatment of lameness and various performance-related musculoskeletal injuries using an integrative approach that includes acupuncture and chiropractic therapy. Her talk will include a live demonstration ...