Probabeel heads stellar evening

 
Probabeel heads stellar evening28 Nov 2021

Our outstanding mare Probabeel’s efforts through the 2020-21 season were acknowledged this evening when she was crowned New Zealand’s Horse of the Year.

The results were announced at a virtual event screened on Trackside with Probabeel gaining just over half of the 57 votes cast to land the title.

It is the fifth successive year that a mare has been named the Horse of the Year, following doubles by Melody Belle and Bonneval. New Zealand-bred mare Verry Elleegant was recently named the 2021 Australian Horse of the Year and a mare has won the Australian title 14 times this century.

Probabeel, who was also named Champion Sprinter-Miler, gained 29 votes for the SENZ Horse of the Year title. Our heartfelt thanks go to trainer Jamie Richards and the Te Akau operation headed by David Ellis, who purchased Probabeel as a yearling at Karaka for $380,000.

Probabeel's racing exploits in Australia also contributed to our Cambridge Stud principals Brendan and Jo Lindsay being named Owners of the Year.

We had three individual Group I winners during the season, the other being New Zealand 1000 Guineas winner Khama Lass and a shareholding in Champion Two-Year-Old Sword Of State, and seven Group-placed runners.

Probabeel did all her racing in the 2020-21 season in Australia and measured up in top company in both her spring and autumn campaigns. The Savabeel mare was a Group I winner in Sydney and Melbourne and recorded four wins, all in the Group company, and two seconds from eight starts.

No other New Zealand-trained horse won a Group I race in Australia during the season.

Probabeel won the GI Epsom Handicap in Sydney and the GI Futurity Stakes in Melbourne and ended her four-year-old campaign when second, beaten a short-head, in the GI Queen of the Turf Stakes.

She has already franked that form in the new season, with two wins, including the GI Caulfield Stakes, at the Melbourne spring carnival, to take her career earnings to $4.5 million.