Magnificent mare Mariamia (Toronado) has been crowned the inaugural Inglis Digital Horse of the Year.
Mariamia was purchased by John Kelly of Newhaven Park through the 2022 Inglis Digital March (Early) Online Sale for $335,000, having been offered as a racing & breeding prospect by Shane Stockdale on behalf of owners.
At the time of Kelly’s purchase of Mariamia, she’d raced 28 times for four wins, and was G3 placed.
Fast forward 17 months and she is now a G1 winner of The Galaxy, a G2 winner of the Expressway Stakes, an earner of almost $1.3m in prizemoney and is one of the most valuable broodmares in the Southern Hemisphere.
Mariamia was awarded the Inglis Digital Horse Of The Month in January, in which she raced twice for two wins including the Expressway Stakes for trainer Joe Pride.
That monthly victory put her in contention to be named Horse of the Year alongside 11 other nominees.
Following her January success, Mariamia would then progress to prove victorious in The Galaxy at Rosehill on Golden Sipper Day.
Mariamia was initially an Inglis Premier Yearling Sale graduate, bought for just $18,000 by Gaspare Stellato from Swettenham Stud’s draft in 2018.
“Thank you very much to all of the team at Inglis. She gave us a lot of thrills, Charles and I and our families, she’s been a great mare for us,” Newhaven Park’s John Kelly said.
“It’s a great concept, the Inglis Digital concept. It gives everyone an opportunity to purchase horses at all levels and just goes to show you how many wonderful horses come through the Inglis Digital system and Mariamia’s one who was great for us.”
To view a video on the winners’ announcement with Kelly and Inglis Bloodstock CEO Sebastian Hutch, CLICK HERE.
For being crowned the winner, Kelly has won a $25,000 credit to spend on Inglis Digital in the next 12 months.
Inglis Digital Business Manager Nick Melmeth described Mariamia’s win as “thoroughly deserving’’.
“When the Inglis Digital Horse of the Year concept was born mid last year, we had no idea the extraordinary range of monthly winners we would discover,’’ Melmeth said.
“When you look through them, there’s multiple G1 winners, there’s the dam of a G1-winning 2YO, an Adelaide Cup winner, a hurdler, a 2YO Stakes winner, several Hong Kong stars, progressive young horses, even Curran who was just a $600 purchase and earned more than $330,000 last season alone.
“The 12 finalists were all worthy of their monthly victories and such was the competitiveness and strength of those finalists, any one of a number of them could have been deemed the overall winner but ultimately Mariamia is the true beacon of what the platform has become synonymous with – people can buy a horse on Inglis Digital that turns out to be lifechanging for them.
“To have had one in five races in Australia last season won by graduates of Inglis Digital is really quite staggering and only last week the Darwin Cup was won by an Inglis Digital graduate in Write Your Name, so the trend is continuing into this season already.’’
The August (Late) Online Sale is the next opportunity for buyers to secure top-class prospects online.
The catalogue will be finalised tomorrow and be open for bidding from 3pm.
The final countdown of bidding will begin from 10am Wednesday at inglisdigital.com
