The remarkable Mazu is a rising eight-year-old but has retained his speed and enthusiasm for racing, leading throughout to complete his hat-trick of wins in the Group 3 $250,000 Hall Mark Stakes (1200m) on Saturday.
The Joe Pride-trained Mazu’s previous wins in the Hall Mark were on heavy tracks where he is particularly effective but on the firm track on Saturday, he needed to run a brilliant 1m 8.19s to win again.
This was a training triumph by Pride in so many ways, not the least he led in the trifecta with the siblings King’s Secret and Private Eye finishing second and third with less than a half length separating the three stablemates.
Pride’s other runner, Kerguelen, finished only a length-and-a-half away in fifth position.
“To train the trifecta in any race, particularly a Group 3, is very satisfying,” Pride said. “All four of my horses ran great races.
“But Mazu, what a fantastic old warrior he is. We’ve won three of these in-a-row and done it on a dry track today.
“I think this track’s got a little bit of give in it because In Flight won here last week and she has a similar record where her best form is on wet tracks.”
Mazu ($3.70) was ridden by Rachel King to a courageous head win over King’s Secret ($7.50) with Private Eye ($3.30 favourite) closing off strongly for third, a short neck away.
“I think he knows this is his race; he loves it,” King said of Mazu.
“I was concerned with the firmer deck today, I just didn’t know how he’d let down on it.
“But that last 50m, he pinned his ears back and he just wanted to beat them.
“I love seeing an older horse like that, even if he only wins one race a year, he deserves it.”
The Hall Mark Stakes was the second successive stable trifecta in a feature race at the Randwick meeting after Chris Waller prepared Fireball to beat Campione D’Italia and Diameter in the Group 1 Champagne Stakes.
Mazu improved his record to 10 wins from 46 starts and took his career earnings to $10.8 million for his owners, Triple Crown Syndications managed by Chris Ward and Sam Manion.
Pride then went through the runs of each of his four sprinters starting with Mazu.”Mazu’s grumpy, he’s not the kind of guy you want to hang out with on a long-term sort of basis,” Pride said.”It has to be all on his terms and we let him do that. He does everything as he wants, we don’t tell him what he has to do. He’s enjoying his racing and hopefully there’s another season or two left in him.
“We might give him a break. He doesn’t do much in Brisbane generally, but we’ll get him home and have a look at him.
“King’s Secret was really good. I think, out of the race, he’s probably the real eye-catcher because he’s not ready for all this yet, but I thought it was terrific.
“Private Eye’s probably looking for that a little bit further. Maybe just being a bit older, being first up is not as big an advantage as it used to be, but I thought he was good to the line.
“Kerguelen was super, he was really good from the back – so I couldn’t be happier with how it has worked out for the stable.”
