Madison County Wins Levin Classic

Karaka Select Sale purchase Madison County notched his second consecutive G1 win with a never-say-die performance in Saturday’s Levin Classic at Trentham.

The China Horse Club-owned galloper had already established himself as one of New Zealand’s best three-year-olds, winning the G1 New Zealand 2000 Guineas and G2 Hawke’s Bay Guineas plus placings in the G2 Sarten Memorial and G3 Northland Breeders’ Stakes.

Bred by Garry Chittick, Madison County was a $36,000 buy from the Waikato Stud draft at the 2017 NZB Select Yearling Sale at Karaka and has now won over $530,000 for his owners with three of his four career wins at stakes level.

“He’s not very big, but he’s all heart,” said Andrew Forsman, who trains Mafdison County in partnership with Murray Baker.

“He hadn’t raced for a while and felt the pinch a bit at the end, but he’s very brave.”

Madison County (Pins x Red Delicious) has now had seven starts for four wins, three placings and $530,935 in prize-money.

He will be set for the $1 million Karaka Million 3YO Classic (1600m) at Ellerslie on January 26.

Runner-up Hypnos (Reliable Man) is also a Karaka graduate, selling for $50,000 at the 2017 Select Sale.

Karaka graduate Manolo Blahniq became a stakes winner on both sides of the Tasman Sea with his win in Saturday’s Listed Chester Manifold Stakes at Flemington.

The NZ-bred son of Jimmy Choux won the G3 Eclipse Stakes at Ellerslie as a two-year-old.

The Tony Noonan-trained Manolo Blahniq (Jimmy Choux x Floramour) was a $115,000 Karaka Select Sale purchase by his trainer and has now had 24 starts for four wins, six placings and $362,134 prizemoney.

Debutante Louis Luck provided first crop sire Dissident with his first winner at Trentham on Saturday, becoming the sixth juvenile to qualify for the Karaka Million trained by Te Akau’s Jamie Richards.

Dissident, a G1 winning son of Sebring, stands at Newgate Farm in NSW.

Owned by Cambridge Stud proprietors Brendan and Jo Lindsay, Louis Luck was purchased for $NZ105,000 at the 2018 Karaka Book 1 Sale from the draft of Little Avondale Stud.

He is the first foal out of US stakes winner My Option (Belong To Me), a G3 winner and among six winners out of the Storm Bird mare Chiba.

My Option was purchased for $US290,000 by the China Horse Club from the Keeneland November Breeding Sale and has a current yearling filly by Dissident.