Motspur still flying for champion sire
Flying Spur has added more than $300,000 to his season earnings in the past month and his handsome 8YO son Motspur is the latest contributor, after posting his fourth black type performance when third in yesterday’s $130,000 Clarence River JC Ramornie H. 1200m LR.
Pictured: Motspur winning at Rosehill in January 2011. (PHOTO: Martin King/Sportpix)
Trained by Kris Lees for breeder Bruce Neill and co-owners Wayne & Michelle Bedggood, Motspur won the BRC Falvelon H. LR in 2010, but has earned most of his $525,210 prizemoney in the past two seasons. He claimed the biggest cheque of his career ($66,200) with a popular victory on Scone Cup day two months ago, and followed that effort with a third in the Gosford RC Takeover Target S. LR on 24 June. In all, Motspur has won eleven and placed in 16 of his 45 starts across a remarkable seven-season career, and like many of Flying Spur’s notably good-looking progeny, never fails to turn heads in the mounting yard.
From the US-bred mare Crusading Lil (by Crusader Sword), Motspur descends from Ciboulette, dam of the champion Canadian filly and great broodmare Fanfreluche – Flying Spur’s third dam.
Flying Spur’s excellent 2010/11 record has also been boosted in recent weeks by the bonny 3YO filly Spurcific, who was second in the VRC A.R. Creswick S. LR on 11 June, and returned a fortnight later to record her first win at Flemington for owners Craig Pearce, Shiranee Griffiths, Scott Wendt and Tony Aravanis, and trainer Robbie Griffiths.
There have been fresh highlights offshore too. Sheikh Hamdan‘s home-bred 2YO colt Mushreq (ex Alharir by Jeune) completed a notable Australian-bred quinella in the Greyville Golden Horsehoe G1 in South Africa on 2 July, and 4YO gelding Flying Fulton (bred by Anthony & Joseph Bongiorno from the Zabeel mare Fulton) was third in the Singapore TC Patron’s Bowl Sing-1 on 26 June.
For the seventh year running, Flying Spur is among Australia’s top 15 sires by prizemoney, with $4.9 million, and sits inside the top 10 by stakeswinners, with a total of eight for the season. (Hong Kong-based Sapelli makes it nine worldwide.) And for the fifth time in the past decade, Flying Spur has joined the select group of stallions represented by 100 or more Australian winners in 2010/11, with a current tally of 103.
Flying Spur, Australia’s champion sire of 2007, stands at Arrowfield in 2011 at a fee of $49,500 inc. GST.
