The Placid Ark Stakes launches the Ascot Pinnacles Carnival
The $500,000 Placid Ark Stakes (1200m) launches the Ascot Pinnacles Carnival on Saturday and it promises to be a belter.
With a host of top three-year-olds racing in WA presently, it is certain to live up to its billing and hype.
The race is named in honour of a sprinting great who was inducted into the WA Racing Hall Of Fame in 2010.
Placid Ark was purchased as a yearling by a syndicate headed by popular Perth hotelier Barry McGrath, on the advice of leading Ascot trainer Wally Mitchell. For many of the syndicate this was their initial foray into racehorse ownership.
After winning one of his only two starts at two years, it was at three years that Placid Ark took all before him. Following his win in the group three Sir Ernest Lee-Steere Classic at Ascot in early January, plans were made for Placid Ark to take on the best sprinters in the nation by contesting the ‘Triple Crown’ in Melbourne.
Ridden by regular rider John Scorse, Placid Ark became the first horse to win the group one treble of the Lightning Stakes, Oakleigh Plate and Newmarket Handicap all in the same season. A feat only since replicated by the great sprinter Schillaci.
Following his Melbourne campaign Placid Ark competed in Sydney where at his first start ‘the opposite way of going’ he won the Canterbury Stakes over 1200 metres in track record time before a narrow defeat in the Galaxy Stakes.
His feats as a three year old saw Placid Ark honoured as Australian Racehorse of the Year for the 1986/87 season. A remarkable achievement for a horse purportedly with ‘bad legs’.
Placid Ark’s career ended prematurely in 1988, recording 14 wins and 3 placings from only 21 starts.
Principal Wins
3yo season
Lightning Stakes [G1], Flemington 1000mOakleigh Plate [G1], Caulfield 1100mNewmarket Handicap [G1], Flemington 1200mCanterbury Stakes [G2], Canterbury 1200m
4yo season
A.J. Moir Stakes [G2], Moonee Valley 1000mLinlithgow Stakes [G2], Flemington 1400mWinterbottom Stakes [G2], Ascot 1400mRupert Steele Stakes [G3], Flemington 1200mSir Ernest Lee-Steere Classic [G3], Ascot 1400m
5yo season
Bobbie Lewis Quality [G3], Flemington 1200m
