One to Watch – Randwick

The familiar grey and red diagonal stripe colours of well known Sydney owner Alan Bell have been carried by some outstanding horses and this three year-old debut winner at Randwick on Wednesday may well end up adding his name to the list.

Prepared by Team Hawkes, three year-old More Than Ready (USA) colt Trope has been given plenty of time to mature, but with three recent barrier trials in January was well and truly primed for race day.

Drawn wide in the field of 11, Tommy Berry was happy to let Trope dawdle from the gates and settle last in the 1100 metre maiden, but when angled into the clear at the top of the straight and asked to go forward we saw a very different horse.

Trope grabbed the bit and set sail for home, surging past everything until only Snitzel filly Got Your Six remained in his sights. She fought the brave fight before being headed on the line to go down by a head.

"It’s a credit to Alan (Bell) and our team as he’s taken a lot of time to come to hand,” said Michael Hawkes.

"To be fair he still doesn’t really know what he’s doing.

"Tommy probably got a bit further back than we thought, but we tell them to ride them where they are comfortable and once he got him balanced up he really attacked the line.

"Hopefully we have another nice horse on the rise, but we’ll just take it race by race.”

A $500,000 Inglis Easter purchase for Alan Bell from the Cressfield draft, Trope is a half-brother to stakes-placed Selectify and Laser Flash being the fifth winner from five foals to race from stakes-winning Galileo (IRE) mare Personify.

A half-sister to Group I winner Laisserfaire, Group III winner A Time for Julia and stakes-winners Time Thief and Foreplay, Personify is from blue hen Procrastinate and was bought for $2million at the 2008 Inglis Australian Broodmare Sale by Keiran Moore Bloodstock on behalf of Cressfield.

Cressfield will offer the current yearling from Personify, a filly by Fastnet Rock, at Inglis Easter as Lot 177.