Horses To Follow » Zoowraa

Zoowraa

Zoowraa was impressive in winning a competitive seven-furlong fillies’ listed race at Newbury on Saturday. Drawn low, she raced on the far side for Philip Robinson, and she was able to just tuck in behind Face Reality, who set a fast pace for that group. It was clear that the far side were in front two furlongs out, but effectively it was actually Zoowraa and Face Reality who were in front, the pair pulled away from the horses that raced directly behind them, and those horses were still actually level with rest of the field. Given that, it was plenty early enough for the pair of them to be in front but Zoowraa always looked to be travelling really well anyway, she collared Face Reality one and a half furlongs out before really picking up well and stretching away to win impressively inside, with John Gosden’s Flood Plain staying on into second.

Zoowraa had been well-touted coming into this and she duly delivered with a really nice performance, on what was just her second ever run. She may have benefitted from racing in the centre of the track, but she drifted towards the far rail later in the race, which shouldn’t have been ideal, and it was actually there where she ended up doing her best work, showing a really nice turn of foot to put three lengths between herself and her rivals. She was a really impressive winner on her racecourse debut at Redcar at the start of the month, beating the useful Calypso Magic by an easy five lengths, with the first three finishing clear and in an impressive time, just 0.3 seconds slower than the older horse’s listed race run over the same distance later on the card.

This daughter of Azamour is an exciting prospect now, she should be able to get further than seven furlongs next year, but it’s worth noting that her dam was actually a specialist over seven and her half-brother won two valuable handicaps in Dubai over six and seven furlongs, so there is a lot of speed in her pedigree as well. A quote of 16/1 for the wide-open 1000 Guineas looks fair enough at this stage.

23rd October 2010