Harness
Keayang Zahara closes in on history with Maori Mile triumph
While the ink is far from dry on the $500,000 Summer Of Glory bonus cheque, superstar mare Keayang Zahara is on track to provide her connections with a windfall after her effortless win in the Group 1 $100,000 Aldebaran Park Maori Mile.
Keayang Zahara cruised to the front from her favourable front-row draw and barely got out of second gear as she reeled off a 26.9 last 400 metres, scoring by five metres from reigning Inter Dominion champion Arcee Phoenix and Im Bobby.
"It gives you goosebumps," driver Glen Craven said after the race.
"She felt like she was doing it pretty comfortably and I didn't ask much of her. It's all ahead of her and hopefully she can just keep doing what she's doing," he said.
Co-trainer Paddy Lee was non-committal about the plethora of feature races on the five-year-old's immediate agenda.
"She'll tell us," Lee said.
"We'll go home and see if she eats up and make sure she recovers well and they'll map out a plan of where she goes over the next six weeks," he said.
Keayang Zahara is poised to rewrite the trotting annals, having already notched up 11 Group 1 victories from only 22 career starts.
And with more than $980,000 in stake earnings, the daughter of Volstead is fast closing in on Queen Elida and One Over Kenny as the most prolific earning trotting mare in Australasia.
Adding further strength to the stable's dominant night, star trotter Jilliby Ballerini claimed the other trotting feature on the card, the Aldebaran Park Bendigo Trotters Cup, once again underlining her dominance at the top level. Despite starting from the 30-metre handicap, her class ultimately told.
Check out our FREE Interactive Speed Maps for meetings in nine countries each and every day.