Cover image courtesy of Ashlea Brennan
Nadia Angelo and partner Anna Dodgshun are Melbourne lawyers, but they are also racehorse owners. The couple has shares in 22 thoroughbreds, something that ties them up with stable and racetrack visits every weekend. But nothing prepared them for the rollercoaster of being in boom colts Profiteer (Capitalist) and Stay Inside (Extreme Choice).
“I don’t think I’m going to sleep for the next four weeks,” Angelo said. “Contending with two different syndicates with two different horses that are first and second in the Golden Slipper line of betting, it’s out of this world.”
Nadia Angelo, Leigh Saville and Anna Dodgshun | Image courtesy of Roll The Dice Racing
Winning beginnings
Angelo is the lawyer behind Racing.com and is in both colts, while Dodgshun, a partner at the law firm Wisewould Mahony, is in Profiteer. The couple has been investing in racehorses since 2014, enjoying instant success when their first purchase, gelding Gredington (Magnus), who won on debut at Cranbourne. Thereafter they got involved with Rob Norton at Roll The Dice Racing.
“It was about the time Roll The Dice was racing Mahuta, and it looked to us like they were winning everything, so we got involved with the boys,” Angelo said. “There’d be this horse for sale and we’d buy into it, and then another one and we’d buy into that. And it just went from there.”
“There’d be this horse for sale and we’d buy into it, and then another one and we’d buy into that. And it just went from there.” - Nadia Angelo
The ownership experience for both Angelo and Dodgshun is much more than high heels and champagne. Both are involved heavily in the horses they part-own.
“We try to get to the track for all of our horses,” Angelo said. “We see the trainer before the race and check to see if the horses have travelled okay. We engage in all of the mounting yard activity pre and post-race, and this is what we’ve missed during these tough pandemic times.”
Profits at Randwick
The couple bought into Profiteer through Roll The Dice Racing and, when the colt won on debut at Flemington in early January, he fulfilled a long-held ambition for Angelo to own a winner at headquarters. The near 3l win was spectacular, so when Angelo and Dodgshun flew to Sydney for the R.Listed Inglis Millenium a fortnight ago, they were expecting big things.
Profiteer | Image courtesy of Ashlea Brennan
“That was a crazy weekend,” Angelo said. “We had Alloway run second in the Tasmanian Derby the night before, and so we flew in and flew out of Hobart that day before flying to Sydney for the Millenium the next morning. You can imagine the day it turned out to be after winning a $2 million race. I don’t think my feet have touched the ground yet.”
The girls dispatched the Inglis novelty cheque into oversize baggage for the flight home, while co-trainer Mick Price drove the trophy, which they exclaim is huge, back to Melbourne in his car.
“It was a weekend full of sashes and trophies,” Angelo said. “In a few days you go from the lowest of lows to the highest of highs in this game. It’s incredible.”
Extreme choices
Exactly a week after Profiteer’s Randwick victory, Stay Inside coasted home by 4l in the Pierro Plate, keeping his undefeated career intact and his Golden Slipper tilt likely. It was a second extraordinary result within a week for Angelo, who had also been involved, albeit casually, with the colt’s sire Extreme Choice.
“When Extreme Choice was going around, I went to every race with the boys in that syndicate and I ended up being named the horse’s mascot,” she said. “I wasn’t in the horse, but I just happened to be there all the time cheering him on, and when they did the deal with Newgate Farm just before the 2016 Golden Slipper, we all said we’d have to race the progeny together.”
Stay Inside was picked up at the 2020 Magic Millions Gold Coast Yearling Sale for $200,000, one of three by Extreme Choice that Angelo now has shares in. Profiteer was a $165,000 purchase at the Inglis Classic Yearling Sale, the same price paid for his sire Capitalist. And the providence rolls on. Both Stay Inside and Profiteer will bid for a spot to stand alongside their sires at Newgate Farm, with the breeding operation announcing its purchases last week of the standing rights to both colts.
Choosing between your children
When pressed, Angelo admitted that Profiteer is her pick for the Golden Slipper.
“Profiteer burned the track when he won at Flemington, and it was a very well-rated race,” she said. “We weren’t sure what was going to happen with him when he went the Sydney way, but Hugh Bowman trialled him a few days before the race and he was super impressive. But equally, Stay Inside’s races have rated really well too. In a way, it’s almost unfair that they’ll come up against each other in the one big race. You’d almost hope that one would go one way, and one the other. It’s not a bad thing to be complaining about.”
"In a way, it’s almost unfair that they’ll come up against each other in the one big race. You’d almost hope that one would go one way, and one the other. It’s not a bad thing to be complaining about.” - Nadia Angelo
Angelo and Dodgshun are a racing marketer’s dream. They are career women and fan girls, the type of owners that can read the form but lean right over the rails to snatch a pat off one of their horses. And, in recent years, they tip-toed into the breeding business with visits to Magic Millions and a mare called Miss Cavatica (Myboycharlie {Ire}).
“We own her outright,” Angelo said. “She gave Jackie Horner her first win as a trainer-jockey and, when we retired her, we sent her to Artie Schiller. We had this love affair with him because of our involvement with Artie Dee Two and Roll The Dice Racing a few years back.”
Miss Cavatica resides at Stockwell Stud, a jaunty drive for the girls from their Kensington home in Melbourne’s suburbs to the farm at Diggers Rest. The mare dropped her Artie Schiller (USA) foal in October and went straight back to the stallion, who stands at Stockwell for $11,000 (inc GST).
“We did a mating plan for her and found that Artie Schiller was right at the top,” Angelo said. “And we were a bit obsessed with him anyway, so it worked out well.”
Angelo and Dodgshun will fly to Sydney for the Golden Slipper in three weeks’ time. All being well, Profiteer and Stay Inside will divide the girls’ loyalties and return their faith.
“We laugh sometimes and ask ourselves why we didn’t take bigger shares,” Angelo said. “The reality is, though, that we’ve spread the risk and this way we can enjoy more horses, watch more races and invest more.”
