Annabel Neasham experienced the best and worst of racing in the space of a few seconds with one of her two Inglis Millennium runners posting a sensational win as the other suffered a heavy fall.
Neasham’s first thought was for two-year-old Dorothy Gail and her jockey Tom Marquand, who crashed to the turf near the 300m, the trainer racing onto the track to check on their welfare.
The filly appeared to escape relatively unscathed while Marquand was conscious but was taken to St Vincent’s hospital with a suspected shoulder injury and concussion.
“It’s a funny moment, you win a race but your friend and rider (jockey Tom Marquand) is down on the track,” Neasham said.
“I hope he’s OK.”
Celebrations for Learning To Fly’s ($4 fav) stunning win were subdued but the filly did an enormous job to overcome a wide draw and storm down the outside to defeat Blanc De Blanc ($7) by a short neck.
Kundalini ($5) finished another three-quarters of a length away to deliver a trifecta for the fillies.
While Neasham was yet to fully digest Learning To Fly’s feat, she was full of praise for a “very special” filly.
“I’ll have to watch it again, my eyes were split,” she said.
“But she had a lot of work to do from the draw and probably the way the track was playing today, that horses were making up ground, it made me a little bit more confident.
“I have to pinch myself a little bit. I’m almost speechless to win a big race like that in those colours, it’s very special.”
Learning To Fly is by Justify who stands at Coolmore Stud, which offered the prize of a Ferrari to the owners of the first horse by the stallion to win one of eight eligible races.
The Inglis Millennium (1100m) was one of them but with Coolmore the major stakeholders in the youngster, Coolmore’s Tom Magnier said the Ferrari would go to another member of the ownership group.
The winner gave Chad Schofield back-to-back victories in the $2 million feature, which he claimed 12 months ago on Xtravagant Star, and it was an especially sweet success after he was involved in a race fall at Canterbury on Friday night and had to be cleared by the club doctor to ride.
Schofield has partnered Learning To Fly right through her preparation and believes the best is still to come.
“She is just a beautiful horse. I love her, I have loved her from the moment I sat on her the first time and she just keeps getting better which is the scary part,” Schofield said.
“She showed her versatility today by coming back, relaxing and then showing a blistering turn of foot.
“She covered a lot of ground out there today, she cornered wide but still had the tenacity to close that race off the way she did.”
As for the chances of Coolmore gifting the winning jockey a Ferrari, Schofield said he’d already ‘driven’ one.
“They’ve already given me one Ferrari being the horse, but I’d be happy to take another,” he quipped.
