Legarto’s sister impresses at trials

Trainers Ken and Bev Kelso will be hoping lightning can strike twice.

The Matamata conditioners unleashed promising juvenile Latoya (NZ) (Proisir) to win over 800m at the Avondale trials on Tuesday, with the Proisir filly showing she has inherited at least some of the family ability.

The two-year-old’s sister is the star mare Legarto, a five-time Group One winner for the Kelsos who recently sold for A$2.8 million as a broodmare, and while Ken Kelso is not one to get too far ahead of himself, he is pleased with what he has seen from Latoya to date.

“She's a good doer,” Kelso said. “She's got a little bit of sass about her and I suppose in some way she's similar to Legarto, but she's a smaller version.

“We were pleased with her trial today and she improved a lot from her first hit-out at Waipa.

“We were a bit puzzled by her first trial. Opie (Bosson) had been working her and jumped her out, and we expected it to go well. She was very slow away. She turned her head in the barrier and they went like cut cats and ran her off her feet.

“We were expecting an improvement today and she certainly did that.”

The Warwick Jeffries bred and raced filly will likely make her raceday debut in the coming weeks, although her conditioners are critical of New Zealand’s two-year-old programming, which sees juveniles largely pitted against older rivals at this time of year.  

“I just said to the owner, we'll see how she does post-trial,” Kelso said. “Finding a two-year-old race is very difficult. I went through the program after the trial and I couldn't find any. They're all two- and three-year-old-plus.

“I think it’s totally ridiculous. The two-year-olds are our future, we need to have two-year-old races for these horses.

“If you think they're a Guineas-type of horse, it’s nice to give them a two-year-old start at this time of year against their own age. It's very hard with the (wetter) tracks and running against older horses. You have three-year-old races, so why don't we have two-year-old races?”

The Matamata horseman followed with great interest the recent sale of Legarto at the Magic Millions Broodmare Sale where global giant Yulong secured the stunning mare for A$2.8 million.

“She’ll get every chance as a broodmare with Yulong and I believe she is going to be mated with Extreme Choice in spring. I messaged Sam Fairgray and he said that’s the plan,” Kelso said. 

Meanwhile, the Kelsos have an eye toward spring as a number of the stable’s most talented gallopers are back in the stable following a break, including Group One performed sprinter Alabama Lass (Alabama Express).

The four-year-old mare was last seen on Champions Day at Ellerslie when racing to certain victory in the Gr.3 King’s Plate (1200m) only to duck inwards through the running rail and dislodge rider Sam Collett.   

“She looks fantastic. She put on about 60 kilos during her spell. Henley Park did a marvelous job with her,” Kelso said.

“There appears to be nothing physically wrong with her after the fall. The biggest challenge will be placement.

“We're just going to trial her in the spring, we're not going to make any calls on where we're going and just make sure everything's right after that incident at Ellerslie.

“We haven’t ruled out going back to Australia and having another crack at the Moir Stakes (Gr.1, 1000m) where she ran second and was probably a little bit unlucky last year, but there are also options here and it will all be dictated by how she comes up.”

Lightly-raced four-year-old Sarti (NZ) (Snitzel) and talented staying mare Levakia (NZ) (Proisir) are others to look forward to in spring.

“Sarti is a nice horse that will go through the grades and Levakia has also been back about two weeks,” Kelso said. “She looks good and will hopefully make into a nice Cups mare. 

“She's rated 86, so she's going to have to be running in those open class races. We'll probably target some of those Auckland handicap races — maybe a Counties Cup (Gr.3, 2100m) or a Queen Elizabeth II Cup (Gr.3, 2400m). She seems to go better right-handed.”

In addition to Latoya, the hands-on Matamata trainers are pleased with the calibre of younger stock coming through the stable.

“One horse we really like is the half-sister to Feroce, the Almanzor filly Acanthus,” Kelso said. “She's out spelling. She's due back in a couple of weeks, but she showed plenty in her trials and will likely put her hand up in the spring.

“We also like a Super Seth filly out of O’Reilly Rose called Themarierose. She hasn't put her hands up yet, but she wants a firm deck. She's due back at the end of the month.”

Kelso also confirmed smart Ellerslie two-year-old winner Stromlinien (NZ) (Almanzor) as a new addition to the stable, with the Listed Star Way Stakes fourth-placegetter still in pre-training.

“It's going to be a whole new landscape without Legarto, but we’ll be doing our best to find another one,” he said.