21 Oct 2012
The coming week will see a bombardment of facts and figures about Saturday’s W S Cox Plate at Moonee Valley.
One statistic which might go missing is the fact that Super Sire Zabeel has sired more Cox Plate winners than any other stallion.
In 2010 the Moonee Valley Racing Club contacted Sir Patrick Hogan to tell him that Zabeel had won the ‘Kingston Town Greatness Award’ in recognition of the sire being the W S Cox Plate’s most influential sire throughout its then 88-year history.
The Zabeel record of winners in the Cox Plate numbers four, namely
1992: Octagonal
1998: Might and Power
2004: Savabeel
2008: Maldivian
While the 2012 running of the famous weight-for-age feature might not see another winner by Zabeel, there is every chance that the winner could be from one of his daughters with both Ocean Park (Thorn Park ex Sayyida, by Zabeel) and Southern Speed (Southern Image ex Golden Eagle, by Zabeel) being leading prospects.
Zabeel currently leads both the Australian and New Zealand Broodmare Sire Premierships, titles he won for the first time last season. For the record, right now Zabeel is the damsire of 101 individual black type winners, 21 of which have won at Group One level.
This season alone Zabeel is already the damsire of 3 individual Group One winners; Commanding Jewel (Thousand Guineas), Ocean Park (3 x Gr.1) and It’s a Dundeel (Spring Champion Stakes).