Former Singapore juvenile champion Onceuponatime threw up his first winner anywhere in the world when Moonraker made it barrier to box on Sunday.
A three-year-old filly out of Full Moon (also the name of Moonraker’s owner stable) mare Manasari, Moonraker is from the first crop of the David Hill-trained Onceuponatime (x Van Nistelrooy) who carved up a stellar career at Kranji in only 18 starts, being crowned champion two-year-old after landing the Magic Millions Juvenile Championship (1200m) in 2007.
He also won the former (before it became the final Leg of the Singapore Three-Year-Old Challenge) Group 3 Singapore Guineas (1600m) in 2008, but one of his most acclaimed runs probably came in defeat, at his very last race on April 24, 2009 when he stormed home from last in the 2009 Group 1 Lion City Cup to run a super third to Singapore’s icon Rocket Man at long odds of $289.
Onceuponatime was then sent for stud duties in New Zealand to stand at little-known Belmont Park Stud in Timaru, a port city which is about 150km south-west of Christchurch on the South Island.Only a handful of his progeny have raced, mostly in barrier trials in New Zealand, and Moonraker was actually the first to hit the ground running at Kranji on February 19 in a 1200m race on Polytrack. She ran last but showed significant improvement at her next outing to run sixth in another 1200m race but on turf.
She was still bypassed in the betting at her third start on Sunday in the $65,000 Spalato 2014 Stakes, an Intiation race over 1200m on turf, but the $310 longshot turned in a bottler of a run that will definitely not have a line put through her name at her next starts.
Short-priced favourite Mount (Vlad Duric) was further back, but he loomed as the biggest threat at the 300m. Moonraker, however, was not a spent force, actually pulling away to score a most remarkable landmark win for the former Singapore hero. Mount had to settle for second place another two lengths away with Nova Victory (Salim Yusoff) third another half-length away.
The winning time was 1min 11.34secs for the 1200m on the Long Course.
Hill was absolutely over the Moon, pun fully intended. To see the first child of one of his better horses (probably after Flax, and some leagues after the ‘one’, Hong Kong champion River Verdon) race to her first win will always give goosebumps to even the most case-hardened trainers, and Hill is usually not one given to cloying sentimentality.
“It’s a great thrill to see the first winner from Onceuponatime here or anywhere in the world for that matter,” said Hill.
“That one was probably the more backward of the first two 3YOs (other one is Moon Charm) by Onceuponatime who came to me, but she’s the quick one. She was always nervous and you could tell from today how she sweats up.
“But she has really improved and we thought she raced better over the turf than Polytrack. She’s really quick and we told CC to go forward and hold a good position and it’s worked out good.
“If she wasn’t drawn so badly, I think she would have been better-fancied. She’s very quick out of the gates and that helped, as well as the Long Course.
“The other one (Moon Charm) needs more ground and she also ran a nice third at her last start.
“Onceuponatime has been covering very average mares in New Zealand, but the types he has thrown on the ground are very beautiful and balanced sorts. Imagine if he covered better quality mares!
“I have another 3YO here and he is even more backward than the two fillies, but he’s coming along nicely. Then we have four 2YOs who are still in New Zealand but will be on their way here very soon.”
Wong said the instructions were to ride the filly positive from the wide barrier and the rest was pretty much left to him.
“There wasn’t much speed in the race and the instructions were to go forward from the wide draw, but if another horse is quicker to just drop to second or third,” said the Malaysian apprentice jockey.
“We were able to get a soft lead and I was lucky to get her to settle. She was one-paced to the line but she was able to go all the way.
“I think she can stay. To me, she needs more ground, probably 1400m or 1600m.”
