The Ciaron Maher and David Eustace stable have unearthed another staying three-year-old with the win of Namakwa at Flemington.
Making his metropolitan debut after a victory on the synthetic track at Ballarat, Namakwa raced away to a convincing win in the VRC Member Maureen Salter Plate (2000m) and in the process bring up a treble for Maher and Eustace after earlier wins with Grand Promenade and Yulong January.
Ridden by Ben Allen, Namakwa ($9.50) scored by two lengths from Reuber ($5) with Sweet Karolina ($14) a short-head away third.
Namakwa was successful over 2100m at Ballarat at his previous outing and Eustace said there was a nice program for young staying horses through the winter months.
Maher and Eustace used that program for three-year-olds and early season four-year-olds with effect last year with Persan and High Emocean.
Persan went on to run fifth in last year’s Melbourne Cup while High Emocean won the Listed R M Ansett Classic at Mornington last September at her most recent appearance.
“There’s a really nice program for these stayers through winter,” Eustace said.
“Persan and High Emocean went through it last year and hopefully he can do that, but he’s not a strong horse yet.
“I was a little bit surprised that he was able to round if off the way he did.
“He’s not a horse to put into a sexy race just yet, so hopefully we can just tip through the winter and he can keep progressing.”
Eustace said the addition of blinkers, on the advice of work rider Jarod Lorenseni, was instrumental in Saturday’s victory.
“He was a little bit keen for the first 100 metres, I suppose, but he got in behind horses and got a beautiful ride from Ben,” Eustace said.
“And he was strong to the line.”
