Breeding Snippets for October 30th 2026

Pedigree and performance line up neatly this week, with winners drawn from families that have been commercial for decades. Victor Supreme, Sakuntala, Soky’s Sunday, Beach Parade, the Kaikoura trotting family of the Smiths and the Stiven family’s Young Eden line all sit behind recent winners. A quality 2yo trotting filly has given Wai Eyre Farm’s On A Streak timely advertising at exactly the right point in the breeding season, while a Captain Midnight filly at Timaru offers a neat study in line breeding.

Abitibi bred in the purple

4yo Sweet Lou mare Abitibi is bred to be good, very good in fact, but her form line didn’t exactly reflect her lineage, so after winning her second race in 11 starts, albeit on a Wednesday at Addington, her connections, including one Graeme Rogerson, now might be hoping for better things in the future. Rogerson trained Abitibi himself early in her career, but she was sent down to the Dalgetys early in 2026 and until last week had failed to get any closer than seventh in four starts from her new stable.

For Abitibi is the second foal and second winner from a top class mare in Utmost Delight (10 wins plus $257k). First foal and full brother Keto has won five races to date and race timed in 1:53.2 across the Tasman after being snapped up as a debut winner. After foaling Our Ultimate Elsie, her third foal, by Downbytheseaside, Utmost Delight was exported to Western Australia, where she has left further fillies by Downbytheseaside and Captaintreacherous but has not left a foal since 2023.

Utmost Delight was bred in the purple herself, being by champion sire Bettor’s Delight from another top mare in Victor Supreme (17 wins plus $247k). Trained by legendary horseman Peter Wolfenden, Victor Supreme just missed winning an Inter-Dominion final at Addington behind Aussie raider Golden Reign in the mid 90s and at her best was, no doubt, the best pacing mare of her time.

In the broodmare paddock she left 12 live foals with 11 of them getting to the races. Besides Utmost Delight, the best of her progeny were arguably Supremacy (9 wins plus $107k) and Victor’s Delight (14 wins plus $132k). Of interest, Victor Supreme was by Kiwi horse Placid Victor (16 wins plus $278k), who was one of the few sons of Vance Hanover to get a chance as a stallion here in NZ.

Captains Secret and the Sakuntala family

Another well bred winner at Addington’s low key Wednesday meeting was the Stonewall Stud bred and raced Captains Secret. The Captain Crunch – Secret Desire 4yo had no trouble justifying his $1.40 tote price and ran away from his rivals for an impressive win, with his record now standing at four wins and six placings from 22 starts with $39k in the bank.

Dam Secret Desire, also bred and raced by Stonewall, was a very handy race mare, winning eight before going off to the broodmare paddock. She produced nine foals with six of them getting to the races, and Captains Secret was her eighth foal. Her ninth and last foal Secret Beach (by Downbytheseaside) has won four from 10 to date, but those wins came in his first five starts and he is among a group of very promising 3yos chasing top colt Jumal currently.

Second dam Rhythmic Rose (2 wins) was yet another Stonewall product and as a broodmare has left eight winners herself, including good sorts in Sweet Diamond (9 wins plus $169k) and Seaside Rose (8 wins plus $142k). Both the latter mares are now part of the Stonewall broodmare breeding programme.

This family and its pedigree goes directly back to grand producer Sakuntala, unraced, whose breeding deeds would have made hers the most commercial family of the stud book through the 70s and 80s.

Alecto bred to be above average

Alecto easily justified favouritism at Addington when scoring her fourth win from 23 starts for trainer Nathan Purdon and owners the Kane family, and her breeding suggests she is bred to be above average.

The Bettor’s Delight – Time And Tide 3yo filly is a half sister to Queen Lostris (5 NZ wins plus 1:51.2 USA) and Mr Kaplan (7 wins plus $187k) amongst five winners from her race winning Mach Three dam.

Second dam Divine (Christian Cullen – Soky’s Sunday) was unraced and of her 11 foals eight got to the races, with a clear standout being NZ Oaks winner Aardiebytheseaside, now the winner of 23 races with $662k in the bank. The pedigrees of Soky’s Sunday and her dam Tabella Beth have been well exhausted in previous snippet editions, and it has been well documented how this immediate branch has left a number of standout pacers such as Lazarus and Self Assured, to name just a couple.

Alecto looks very capable of getting over the $100k plus benchmark in stakes with races like the NZ Oaks coming up in the near future, and with her pedigree she is likely to ensure herself a career as a commercial broodmare when the racing gig is finally brought to its end.

Mishy and the Beach Parade branch

The maiden win of Mishy, a 3yo filly by Bettor’s Delight from Turbulent Flow and trained by “The Reidman”, was not completely unexpected at Addington last Friday night. It was only career start no.5 and she looks to have enough upside to go a wee bit further, and deeper analysis of her family tree suggests there is positive support for the previous statement.

Dam Turbulent Flow, by American Ideal, won three races and had four foals, all fillies, with Mishy, her third foal, being her first winner. There is a 2yo half sister by Sweet Lou in the background and time will tell if she makes the grade. Second dam Slipstreaming (Dream Away – Idle Franco) didn’t race and Turbulent Flow was her only live foal.

Third dam Idle Franco (Falcon Seelster – Imperial Franco) had just the one race start before going to the broodmare paddock, where she left eight foals for three minor winners. However, one of her unraced daughters was Beach Parade (by Beach Towel), and she catapulted this pedigree into outer space. Seven of her 11 foals of racing age were winners, and big winners at that. Partyon was a top filly winning 17 races plus $638k, Typhoon Stride won 27 races and was race timed in sub 1:50, Line Up was a Group 1 winning 3yo in Australia on his way to 11 wins plus $387k, while Life’s A Beach ($213k) and Bluto ($151k) both won 11 also, and all apart from Bluto, by Sweet Lou, were by champion sire Bettor’s Delight.

Deeper in this immediate family, one finds Tucker’s Rule (10 wins) when trained by Charlie Hunter, and a brilliant pacer in the form of Franco Ice (20 wins plus $617k), who was trained by the one and only Neil Brady in the late 80s.

La Venture gives On A Streak timely advertising

There were a number of very happy people after race favourite La Venture won the Group 3 2yo trot at Addington last Friday night. A week after an open day at Wai Eyre Farm where he was paraded, On A Streak, a son of Cantab Hall, now has a quality young filly going around in this country to strongly advertise his credentials as a trotting stallion. He was a precocious 2yo, winning nearly all of his $920k in that season while winning in 1:52.4, and he is currently the leading sire of 2yo trotters in Australia.

Wai Eyre studmaster Darryl Brown and Aussie owner Pat O’Driscoll of Yabby Dam Farms would have big smiles on their dials, and the win could not have come at a better time, when broodmare owners are agonising over stallions for their prize trotting broodmares. Co trainers Michael Purdon and Allison Ward also share in the ownership of the filly, who they purchased from the Australian yearling sales, and it would come with great satisfaction to have her win a Group race after just start no.7.

Australian dam La Serena won eight races from just 29 starts and La Venture is her first foal. The Wai Eyre and Yabby Dam partnership have a weanling filly by E L Titan coming on and the mare is back in foal to On A Streak.

She comes from a great family of trotters developed by the Smiths of Kaikoura. La Serena, by Quaker Jet, is a half sister to Kinaslough (10 wins) and Blackguard’s Corner (8 wins), and her dam Donegal Flat (Pine Chip – Kahu Del), in turn, was a half sister to Harnett’s Creek (13 wins), Cullen’s Creek (9 wins) and Swan Creek (8 wins) in a family well known for producing both high quality pacers and trotters. As an example, a pacing bred gelding by Roydon Glen from a Noodlum mare became our greatest ever trotter, his name Lyell Creek.

Admor Ella line bred to Somebeachsomewhere

Another well bred sire who left an impressive winner at Timaru was Captain Midnight (Captaintreacherous – It Was Fascination, by American Ideal). Admor Ella is one of only two 3yos he has on the ground in NZ. There are 10 2yos registered with seven registered yearlings following on. He served far bigger books in Australia, but of course his semen did not remain available after the 23/24 breeding season.

Admor Ella’s record now stands at four starts for two wins and one placing, and the promising filly certainly looks good enough to go further. Punters certainly thought so at Timaru, making her an even money favourite on the day. Her breeding makes for interesting reading.

Her dam Countess Of Arden (Net Ten EOM – Young Teagan) won four races for the Stivens and Admor Ella is her first foal. Fillies by Always B Miki and Bulldog Hanover have already been sold on and the mare is due anytime to Confederate.

Net Ten EOM is a son of Somebeachsomewhere and Captain Midnight is a grandson of the great horse, so Admor Ella is line bred 3x3 to Somebeachsomewhere, a sire that well known southern breeder John Stiven has always been a big fan of.

Second dam Young Teagan (In The Pocket – Young Eden) qualified only, but eight of her 10 foals got to the races, with Lieutenant Arden, by Sweet Lou, winning six races on both sides of the Tasman and registering a 1:50.7 winning MR.

Young Eden (5 wins) was a very good mare both on the track and in the broodmare paddock, extending what was a very fine pedigree for her southern breeders. Kenny The Cowboy, Roland John and Captain Crazy were three smart examples of her race progeny. Another of her daughters, Young Ros, by noted broodmare sire Falcon Seelster, left Ewie Duncan, who broke the 1:50 barrier in America some 25 years ago, when it would have been a real headline.