Ken Casellas | Photo: Hamilton Content Creators
Eight years ago, Tricky Styx was one of the State’s best two-year-old fillies when she won at five of her nine starts, including the Group 1 Diamond Classic and the Group 2 Champagne Classic — and now she is proving a wonderful brood mare, with the exciting deeds of her first foal Zephyra.
Zephyra exceeded the deeds of Tricky Styx as a two-year-old when she notched her second Group 1 success and took her record as a two-year-old to eight starts for six wins and two placings for stakes of $204,709 when she won the $215,000 Allwood Stud Farm Westbred Classic for two-year-old fillies at Gloucester Park on Friday night.
Zephyra started from the No. 3 barrier on the front line and was a hot $1.20 favourite, with trainer Dylan Egerton-Green sending her forward, three wide, from the outset to wrest the lead from the polemarker and $8.50 second fancy Cabsav after 270m.
Our Lady Jen ($23) raced without cover in the first circuit before $81 outsider Wanea dashed forward from the rear to race in the breeze after a lap.
Zephyra sprinted over the final quarters in 28.8sec. and 28.9sec. and won by a length from Cabsav, who finished with a solid burst. Flametree ($15) was two lengths farther back in third place after racing three back on the pegs.
Zephyra rated 1.57.8 over the 2130m to break the race record of 1.58 that had been shared by the 2015 winner Dodolicious and Wonderful To Fly, who was successful last year.
“I am very happy with Zephyra,” said Egerton-Green. “Getting to the front when we did was good, and then it was a solidly run race. She had her ears pricked crossing the line.
“This was the race that we had been aiming for, and at the moment there is no set program for her.” Whether Zephyra contests the $150,000 Golden Slipper next Friday week will depend on how she pulls up this week. Friday night’s victory gave the 29-year-old Egerton-Green his second success as a trainer in a Group 1 event (following Zephyra’s win in the Diamond Classic last month) and it was Egerton-Green’s eighth Group 1 win as a driver.
Zephyra was bred by veteran Northam horseman Jesse Moore and his wife Maree, who race the filly in partnership with their daughter Hayley.