Golden Colt

Something that the very best horses have is a touch of the X-Factor, and that is certainly the case with JHB and Gai Waterhouse purchase Vancouver who followed up his all-the-way win in the Listed Breeders’ Plate with a brilliant come-from-behind win in the Group 3 Canonbury Stakes at Rosehill this past weekend. For a two-year-old to have shown such versatility at an early stage is a certainly a rare event, and doing all of that while giving 3kg to a very promising field of colts marks Vancouver down as a Golden Slipper prospect of the very highest order.

Vancouver was a $185,000 purchase from the 2014 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale from the draft of Coolmore Stud on behalf of John Camilleri’s Fairway Thoroughbreds. Most excitingly, Vancouver has the pedigree to back up both this early racetrack brilliance, and to suggest that he will only improve as he develops and matures. He is out of the stakes-placed Skates, already dam of a Gr.1 winner in the shape of Juste Momente. Skates is out of Doncaster winner Skating, who is also the dam of Breeders’ Plate winner Murtajill and Magic Millions 2YO Classic winner Bradbury’s Luck.

Congratulations to a fantastic group of owners in Vancouver, including majority shareholders Francis and Barbara Kennedy, who have now incredibly been involved with the past three Breeders’ Plate winners, as well as long-time JHB clients Edmund and Belinda Bateman who secured a share in this exciting colt prior to the Canonbury Stakes. This also represented a great training effort from Gai Waterhouse, getting Vancouver ready on the day with so much on the line on his path to the Slipper. A colt with the ability, pedigree, looks and with a touch of the X-Factor, Vancouver is the kind of horse to keep everyone associated with him dreaming big.