Sufficient Wins in Style

 
10 Jan 2009


By Phillip Quay.


Well-bred three-year-old Sufficient emerged as a New Zealand Derby candidate with his easy two-and-a-half length win at Ellerslie on Saturday in the hands of crack apprentice James McDonald.



 



Sufficient is trained at Takanini by Bruce Wallace who shares in the ownership with Mark Wyborn and Trevor Farmer.



 



Wallace paid $120,000 to purchase Sufficient from the 2007 New Zealand Bloodstock Premier Yearling Sale at Karaka.



 



The Telecom New Zealand Derby (2400m), Gr. 1, is contested at Ellerslie on February 28.



 



The New Zealand TAB reacted swiftly to the win by Sufficient by slashing his Derby odds to just $12 after he had been quoted at $21.



 



By champion Cambridge Stud-based sire Zabeel from the G2 winning Centaine mare, Fleur De Chine, and bred by Hong Kong-based New Zealander Gary Plowman, Sufficient is a half brother to 2002 Australasian Oaks heroine Tully Thunder so is bred to excel over ground.

In fact, his family is steeped in Oaks' history with his third dam Sanderae winning the VRC Oaks in 1970, her granddaughter Sandy's Pleasure successful in that same race's renewal in 1987 and another granddaughter, Sneetch, dam of recent US G1 success story Black Mamba, placing third in a New Zealand Oaks.

Sufficient is expected to have his next start at Ellerslie on January 25 in a three-year-old 1600m event in which he will come up against leading Derby candidate Le Baron.