At the stallion parades at Darley earlier this year broodmare owners were given the tip that young sire Dawn Approach (IRE) had some very smart two year-olds coming through the Godolphin system and we saw one of them at Canterbury on Wednesday.
The James Cummings trained filly Gongs blitzed her rivals to win the 1100 metre
juvenile fillies maiden by five and a half lengths.A trial winner at the same venue on November 3, Gongs shot straight to the front for Brenton Avdulla and had all her rivals off the bit turning for home.
She kept up a good gallop to the line to win as she pleased in a thoroughly dominant debut.
"That was very impressive," said James Cummings.
"She improved a lot from her trial and you couldn't be any happier after that win.
"It's lovely to see a two year-old with that sort of speed from the gate, she was in a different post code.
"It's good for her sire Dawn Approach and we can now look for a nice race for her next year."
Bred and retained to race by Darley, Gongs is a half-sister to stakes-placed Mesa and is the fifth winner from five foals to race out of stakes-winning Bel Esprit mare Belcentra, who was bought by Darley at the 2009 Magic Millions National Broodmare Sale for $500,000.
Darley on-sold her in 2016 at the Inglis Australian Broodmare Sale for $90,000 and she produced a filly by Denman for her new owners before dying later in the year.
That filly will be offered by Widden Stud as agent at the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale as Lot 279 and with Gongs adding some excitement to the pedigree, she's going to be a filly well worth inspecting.
Gongs has the honour of being the first Southern Hemisphere bred winner for Darley's four time Group I winning Galileo son Dawn Approach, the Champion 2YO Colt and 3YO Miler of his generation.
He is the sire of 13 winners from his first Northern Hemisphere crop of two year-olds that have been racing this year and they include four stakes-place-getters.
Dawn Approach stands at a fee of $22,000.
