For those who witnessed the first race at the Gold Coast on Saturday, you would have seen something very exciting.
Alesprit, a three-year-old filly by Bel Esprit out of the Rory’s Jester mare Rory’s Babe, was having her first start for our stable after being transferred from Rockhampton in far-north Queensland in an attempt to win city races.
Alesprit had always shown plenty of ability from her three career starts, but after returning from a knee injury, her effort had to be seen to be believed.
Alesprit scorched around the Gold Coast circut and recorded a time of 49.77 seconds for the 900m, only 0.11 seconds outside the track record. Her last 600m was run in just 31.78 seconds. To add to this, jockey Garry Baker never seemed to ask her for 100% at any stage.
To fully understand her achievement on Saturday, we can compare her times to those of Lucky Secret who won the Group 2 Schillachi Stakes at Caulfield over 1000m on the same day. His 1000m was run in 55.97 seconds and his last 600m in 33.14 seconds. This 55.97 was a new track record for Caulfield.
Congratulations to the winning owners Sidney and Diane Everingham. This is their first horse with Laming Racing and the relationship couldn’t have started in a better way. There is sure to be plenty more wins in store for Alesprit.