Racing NSW are trying something new this long weekend with the inaugural Equimillion featuring $1million in prizemoney offered on a range of classes covering four disciplines – show horse, eventing, dressage and showjumping – so if you are interested in what horses are competing on which days read on.
Saturday is all about the show horses with a mix of led and ridden classes for thoroughbreds being retrained to be beautiful and perform tractably on the flat in various workouts involving walk, trot and canter plus usually a hand gallop which can get a bit spicy for the new recruits!
Classes start at 8am and click here to see the draw.
There are some familiar racing names in the draw to keep an eye out for including Group I winners Avilius (GB), a former Godolphin star, Angel of Truth, an Australian Derby winner and Hot King Prawn, who was the star Hong Kong sprinter of his time, also Group III winner The Candy Man.
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Also on Saturday is the dressage phase for the horses competing in the eventing section which requires thoroughbreds to complete a dressage test, then a cross country jumping course and finally a showjumping round. The cross country and jumping phases of their competition on Sunday and will be a highlight for the three day show.
Click here to see the draw for the eventing section with Olympian Shane Rose to be seen in action and on the horse front a couple of obvious stakes-winners engaged are Wu Gok and Ruling Dynasty.
The straight dressage section gets some cross over from the show horses with some dual entries including Hot King Prawn and Angel of Truth set to showcase their talents in 60 x 20 dressage arena where it’s all about control and calmness. Click here to see the dressage draws.
Interesting entry is $4million earner Le Romain and Eduardo, although that would be a very quick turn around for him given he ran his final race when fourth in the Group III ATC Concorde Stakes at the start of the month.
And so to Monday and the showjumping section with classes from 65cm up to 1.10m with the competition starting at 9am and the 90 to 1.10 classes are on the Olympic arena, so if you’re like me and was a spectator at the showjumping at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, it’s going to be a bit exciting to have a ride on that arena!
Click here for the showjumping draws 90cm to 1.10m and the riders include Sky and 7 Horse Racing presenter Aly Mosely and Jess Bott, Thoroughbred Sport Horse Association’s Krissy Harris, versatile jockey Jeff Penza as well as yours truly.
Click here for the showjumping draws 65 – 80 cm, some Group I winners here including Delectation, Le Romain, Avilius and Eduardo also in the entries.
