Karaka Graduates Lead Kiwi Charge at Eagle Farm

Kiwi breds were in hot form at Eagle Farm on Saturday landing four of the feature events on a bumper card of racing and leading the way were Karaka graduates War Machine (NZ) and Kovalica (NZ).

Rising star War Machine (NZ) (Harry Angel) brought up the 20th Group One win of the season for a Karaka graduate – and the 14th in Australia – with a powerhouse performance in Saturday’s A$3m Group One The Star Stradbroke Handicap (1400m) at Eagle Farm.

War Machine was bred by members of Ardsley Stud’s Wallace family, and he was offered in Ardsley drafts at Karaka 2022 and the Ready to Run Sale but failed to meet his $100,000 reserves. He has now had 13 starts for six wins, four placings and A$2.48m in stakes.

The exciting four-year-old is the 10th individual Karaka graduate to win at the elite level in Australia this season, joining Aeliana (NZ) (Castelvecchio), Antino (NZ) (Redwood), Atishu (NZ) (Savabeel), Ceolwulf (NZ) (Tavistock), Feroce (NZ) (Super Seth), Gringotts (NZ) (Per Incanto), Linebacker (NZ) (Super Seth), Maison Louis (NZ) (Super Seth) and Mr Brightside (NZ) (Bullbars). Antino, Ceolwulf and Mr Brightside all recorded multiple Group One wins.

The Ben, Will and JD Hayes-trained War Machine’s sensational Stradbroke victory honoured the memory of the late Mike Moroney, who trained him for the first 10 starts of his career, along with Michael Wallace, who sourced the gelding’s dam Caserta (Hussonet) on behalf of his family. The Stradbroke came less than a week after the untimely loss of the latter.

“We're very proud, it was an amazing result today,” Ben Hayes said. “The Wallace family bred this horse and is in the ownership group. They've had a really tough time lately and hopefully his win today will make them feel better.

“Also Mike Moroney, we're fortunate to be able to be entrusted with this horse. He's an amazing, exciting horse, and to be able to have a horse like this to train is just amazing. To be able to get a result like this for Will, JD, the whole team, Mike Moroney, his family, the Wallace family – it's really, really exciting.”

War Machine went into the Stradbroke as a hot favourite, having scored a runaway victory in the Group Three BRC Sprint (1350m) at Doomben late last month. Saturday marked a big step up in class from an awkward draw in gate 12, but War Machine rose to the occasion in style.

Jockey Tim Clark took up a handy position in eighth, three-wide but with cover, then presented him on the outside of the leaders at the top of the home straight.

An explosive burst of acceleration carried War Machine into a clear lead with 250 metres remaining, and he kept going strongly to beat the fast-finishing Yellow Brick (The Mission) by three-quarters of a length.

“Obviously I was thrilled to get on him today,” said Clark, who had his first ride on War Machine on Saturday. “He put the writing on the wall a few weeks ago and it was a pleasant surprise on Sunday morning when I got the news.

“He got away okay. He was just laying on the side of the gates a little bit, but he got away okay and it worked out pretty well from that draw.

“Myself and Ben, we spoke before the race. We just wanted to get on a three-wide line with a bit of cover.

“He travelled so well, I probably let him loose a bit early. But this was the grand final, there's no tomorrow, so I wasn't going to die wondering.

“He let rip, really let rip. Maybe just wandered a little bit late. He could feel Yellow Brick coming late and sort of surged again.

“I can't take too much credit for it. What a great job by Ben and his brothers to just have him spot on for today. I was just the lucky one to get the call-up.”

Group One-winning Karaka graduate Kovalica (NZ) (Ocean Park) continued his love affair with the Queensland Winter Carnival on Saturday, capturing the A$1.2m Group Two HKJC World Pool Q22 (2200m) at Eagle Farm.

Kovalica was offered by Curraghmore in Book 1 of Karaka 2021, where Mulcaster Bloodstock bought him for $110,000. He has had 30 starts for seven wins, eight placings and A$4.18m in stakes – more than 41 times his purchase price.

The Chris Waller-trained Kovalica burst on to the scene during the 2023 carnival in Brisbane, winning the Group One Queensland Derby (2400m) and Group Two Queensland Guineas (1600m) and placing against older horses in the Group One Doomben Cup (2000m).

The quality gelding spent the next couple of years outside the winners’ circle, but was beaten by a nose when second in the Group One Epsom Handicap (1600m) in the spring of 2023 and also recorded top-six finishes in the Group One Cox Plate (2040m), Queen Elizabeth Stakes (2000m), King Charles III Stakes (1600m) and later editions of the Doomben Cup and Epsom Handicap.

He was right back at the peak of his powers on Saturday, launching a sustained finish from the back of an eight-horse field to join New Endeavour (New Bay) and Fawkner Park (Zoffany) in a desperate three-way tussle to the finish. Kovalica lunged at the finish line and prevailed by a short half-head.

“It took the length of the Eagle Farm straight to get there,” Waller said. “First win for a couple of years, but we haven’t lost faith in him and he’s been a good horse without winning. He’s been working to something good.

“He might win his next race again this time next year, if not two years. He’ll be back to Queensland.”

Kovalica was ridden to Q22 victory by Nash Rawiller.

“It was a long ride back to scale, making sure that I’d got there,” he  said. “What a horse he’s been. We made a call during the week – as late as Tuesday morning – to put the blinkers on today. You could tell in the run that he was going to do something. He’s so strong. I thought he’d keep going, even though he pulled a bit in the race.”

Kovalica was bred by Nearco Stud and is by Ocean Park (NZ) out of Vitesse (NZ) (Makfi), a half-sister to three-time Australian Group One winner (The) Bostonian (NZ) (Jimmy Choux).