A decade of excellence was crowned in imperious fashion for China Horse Club when its international racing and breeding divisions celebrated milestones of considerable measure.
Militarize, the Australian based wonder colt, recorded the Club’s 50th G1 win with a display of searing speed that will long burn in the memory. Against what was regarded as one of the best field’s ever assembled for the stallion making AUD1,000,000 G1 Golden Rose, Militarize gave most a start and all a beating to record his third G1 triumph in only seventh start.
Before the weekend closed, the Club’s breeding division also toasted to success when the CHC USA bred Saudi Crown led throughout to snare the USD1,000,000 G1 Pennsylvania Derby and become its fifth individual G1 graduate worldwide. The success presents trainer Brad Cox and connections with the wonderful quandary of targeting the Breeders’ Cup World Series or save the colt for the world’s richest race, the USD20 million Saudi World Cup.
The exceptional weekend of results included:
- Militarize wins his 3rd G1 and CHC’s 50th worldwide in the AUD1,000,000 G1 Golden Rose
- Saudi Crown becomes the 5th G1 winner bred by CHC when leading throughout to win the USD1,000,000 G1 Pennsylvania Derby
- CHC Australia bred and part-owned, Ozzmosis, remains undefeated with a slick win in the AUD200,000 Listed Heritage Stakes
- Gold Bullion stamped himself as a serious contender for the AUD2,000,000 G1 Victoria Derby with a determined win in the Victoria Derby Preview
“Militarize’s Golden Rose marks a great milestone for our club and what we set out to achieve when we launched in 2013,” China Horse Club Chairman, Teo Ah Khing said.
“We are blessed to have assembled a network of international partnership without peer. Sharing successes over a decade with the likes of Newgate Farm, Kenny Troutt and WinStar Farm, SF Bloodstock, Sir Owen Glenn (Go Bloodstock), John Magnier and Coolmore, Trilogy and others has enriched our journey.
“We look forward to the next decade and to further adventures with our friends and partners.”
With a profile that lends to improvement with maturity and more ground, there is every reason to believe Militarize may develop into the most significant thoroughbred to race in the red and gold in Australia.
The China Hore Club/Newgate Farm syndicate raced colt moved to within one G1 of Dissident who was purchased privately as a tried horse at the end of his three-year-old career, won a further four G1s and the Australian Racehorse of the Year title before retiring to stud.
Militarize may equal and even surpass that sum this spring. The Chris Waller trainee is undoubtedly the horse to beat in the G1 Caulfield Guineas and may be given his chance in Australia’s weight-for-age championship, the AUD5,000,000 G1 Cox Plate.
“If he hadn't done enough already [to make a stallion], he certainly has today," Waller said of Militarize immediately after the Golden Rose.
“It was a classic Golden Rose, a good field. I guess we had a nice, favorable draw, a confident jockey, and I always thought the 1400 meters would be a bit short.
"We chose to put the blinkers on, which I don't like doing too early in a horse's career, but it might've just got us home. Everything worked out well. A bit of traffic in the straight, but he's an amazing jockey.”
There is every reason to believe that at some point in the near future, the discussion of where Militarize sits within the China Horse Club’s pantheon of great racehorses will arise. The undefeated U.S. Triple Crown winner Justify remains unmovable having repeatedly defied history in a six start career. Life Is Good (4 G1s), Abel Tasman (5 G1s for CHC and partners), Improbable (4 G1s), Dissident (4 G1s for CHC and partners), Australia (3 G1s), State of Rest (2 G1s for CHC and partners), Yoshida (2 G1s), Russian Revolution (2 G1s) and Madison County (2 G1) align behind him having all made significant contributions towards the tally of 50 G1 victories.
The spring also holds great anticipation for Ozzmosis. Undefeated in three starts to date, the Zoustar colt looked to have more in hand when tested in stakes company for the first time. The G1 Coolmore Stud Stakes is his spring target via the G2 Roman Consul Stakes.
No More Tears is set to deliver a full sibling to Ozzmosis this spring and has a Wootton Bassett colt on the ground.