Abidewithme scores at Caulfield

The 2009 crop of Redoute’s Choice is one of his very best, with 21 stakeswinners from 107 named foals – an exceptional strike rate of 19.6%.

They are not short of quality either: 13 of them have won in Group company and three of those, champion sprinter Lankan Rupee, South African star Wylie Hall and Oaks winner Royal Descent, are Group 1 winners.

Nor is their record complete. A week after Royal Descent returned this season to claim the ATC Warwick S. G2 on 22 August, Sir Patrick & Lady Hogan’s homebred mare Abidewithme has won her season debut at Caulfield.

Watch Abidewithme’s win at Caulfield.

Already the winner of eight races in New Zealand, including last season’s Waikato RC Travis S. G2, Abidewithme was making her first raceday appearance since being transferred to the Melbourne stable of Peter Moody. 

The Mares Handicap over 1400 metres also attracted last season’s VRC Oaks G1 winner Set Square who settled just ahead of Abidewithme at the rear, while Danestroem and Kansas Sunflower made the pace up front.

As the field swung round the turn, Patrick Moloney took Abidewithme wide, while Michael Dee directed Set Square towards the rail.  The pair were more-or-less level at the 200-metre mark, but the 3kg Abidewithme received from Set Square began to tell and she forged to a narrow lead she held over the closing stages of the race.

It was a fine effort by both mares and Abidewithme’s winning time of 1:23.02 was faster than the other three 1400-metre races on the Caulfield card, including Boban’s Memsie Stakes G1.

Abidewithme and her stakes-winning half-sister Miss Scarlatti are the best of six winners from the dual Group winner Crimson (by Zabeel), a three-quarter sister to 1987 Victoria Derby winner Omnicorp, from the family of Singpore Group 1 winner Always Certain (by Not A Single Doubt). Crimson is now retired after foaling a 2014 filly to Group 3 winner Burgundy (by Redoute’s Choice).