Snitzanova caps memorable Spring for Bennett Racing

Cover image courtesy of The Image Is Everything

The black and orange checks of Bennett Racing flooded the racing coverage in both Sydney and Melbourne with Nathan and his team finishing the Spring with 11 metro wins, five at stakes level.

'One hell of a spring'

Alongside stable star Southport Tycoon (Written Tycoon) and exciting filly Snitzanova (Snitzel), Baraqiel (Snitzel) claimed a spot amongst the nation’s elite sprinters when smashing a top-class field in the G2 McEwen S. at Moonee Valley, Fawkner Park (Ire) (Zoffany) secured his third stakes success in the G3 Rosehill Gold Cup, while Warnie (Highland Reel {Ire}) stamped himself as a horse to follow with a close-up third in the G3 Heffernan S. at Caulfield on Saturday.

“It’s been one hell of a Spring, it’s been pretty exciting,” Nathan Bennett said, “Its 100 per cent been our best year.

“It’s been nice to see the hard work has paid off. It has been quite extraordinary to be honest. You never see everything fall into place like it has and we’re just thankful it has happened.

“We felt like the monkey was off the back early in the Spring with Southport Tycoon and then to finish it off with another stakes winner was pretty special. Snitzanova has pretty similar attributes to him actually, she’s just as tough as him, she just fights her guts out which is great; you can’t train that into them. It’s good we are finding those types of horses.

“Off what we’ve seen she will end up in some Group 1 races in the Autumn in New South Wales, in those filly’s races there.”

Although Southport Tycoon had already claimed a Group 1 victory in the Australian Guineas (1600 metres) as a 3-year-old, Bennett believes the Manikato S. was the pivotal Group 1 win needed to cement his status as a standout stallion prospect before heading to Widden Stud, especially given the Australian racing industry’s focus on speed.

“It was a really important Group 1 win for Southport Tycoon, especially dropping back to 1200 metres at weight-for-age,” Bennett said.

“Obviously, he was the Guineas winner as a 3-year-old and then to come back as a 4-year-old and get that ticked off was huge.

“Ciaron and I planned it. A few people probably thought it was an ambitious plan, but we pulled it off.

“He can do it from 1200 metres to middle distances. We’ll see what he can do in the Autumn and we’ll see if he can get another one. To head off to stud as a three-time Group 1 winner would be amazing.

“He’ll have a couple more weeks off and then come back into work.”

Baraqiel's road to recovery

While ecstatic with his season’s results thus far, Bennett shared the disappointing news that emerging topliner Baraqiel, who had failed to win in two starts since his dominant McEwen S. success, had injured his suspensory ligament when finishing third to Nadal (Xtravagant {NZ}) in The Meteorite at Cranbourne.

“Baraquiel was amazing in the McEwen,” Bennett said, “To go from a maiden on May 5 to end up in Group races it was a fantastic effort by him.

“He just got a bit lost down the straight again. He’s had three runs down the straight and just gets the wobbles and looks like he is looking for the rail, maybe that’s just a bit of inexperience.

“In the Meteorite he actually broke down, which was unfortunate. We’ve got him back in rehab now and he has just arrived up at Bong Bong. He is going to go in the hyperbaric chambers. Hopefully we will get him back a bit quicker by doing that. We’ll definitely look towards the Spring with him. The Manikato comes to mind; we know he loves The Valley and if he’s ready he’ll go towards a Goodwood in Adelaide.”

Bennett’s other stakes winner for the Spring came in Sydney, with the Annabel Neasham and Rob Archibald-trained Fawkner Park (Ire) (Zoffany {Ire}). Despite his age, the 6-year-old put the writing on the wall that best is still to come with a strong front running performance.

“Fawkner Park is an amazing horse,” Bennett said. “He’s got a huge turn of foot on him. It’s quite amazing how he grows a leg the Sydney way and sort of struggles the Melbourne way. He’ll stay up in Sydney and I’m already looking forward to his next prep. He keeps raising the bar. He showed he can do it from the front with his win in the Rosehill Gold Cup.

“He’s an exciting horse for the Autumn.”

A large operation, growing from just 15 runners in 2017 to having well over 150 runners a season now across multiple stables, Bennett indicated it was important to keep the momentum rolling and revealed he has a couple of horses earmarked as future headline horses for the stable.

“Zaszou is knocking on the door to become a stakes horse,” Bennett said.

“She had two cracks this prep and she will go to the paddock now, but I’d say she will go close to becoming a stakes horse next prep. She’ll have learnt a lot this prep.

“We’ve also got some nice 2-year-olds coming through. There’s one called Military Tycoon that I know Maher has a lot of time for and another called Fireball Miss that is showing a lot of promise. We’ve also got a horse with Corsten’s called Zouclaire who is putting her hand up as a 2-year-old. I dare say, one of those three might put their hands up in the coming months.”

Building on momentum

On the back of his recent success, Bennett will head to the 2025 Gold Coast Magic Millions Sales in January with plenty of support and ammunition, with the aim of finding their next stallion prospect.

“It’s what everyone wants to do, to find a stallion, but it’s pretty hard to pull off,” Bennett said.

“We’re going to have a crack at it. We have a group of us that are looking to go to the sales with a bit of cash to spend. We won’t go crazy and go and buy the million-dollar horses, we’ll just stick to our plan and pick the colts that are at the top of the list from our side of things.

“We look at types first. We will look at a horse six to eight times before it will get through to the final list and then once it gets through, then we start going through pedigrees and making sure it is sellable. We add that all together and then the vet has to tick it off. Sometimes you end up with about 100 on your shortlist and then you bid on those and then obviously budget comes into it. It is hard work but we just make sure we stick to the plan and make sure we see the horse as many times as possible. We’re often looking for a reason to knock a horse off the list, rather than keep it on. We remain very disciplined and try to buy horses for good value that we love.

“We were just chatting about how we’re going to have enough horses for everyone to jump in, because we’ve had a lot of people asking but we’ll just set up some lists and make sure everyone gets all the information as we’re buying the horses. We’ll make sure the existing owners don’t miss out as well.

“It is a great time to jump into ownership. You notice a lot of syndications win these high prizemoney races which is fantastic and is what will keep the game growing.

“We’re really looking forward to whole sales season again, we love that part of it.”

Despite recent success, it wasn’t an easy rise for Bennett Racing to mix it with biggest and best syndicators in the game. It required Bennett to risk it all to compete with the likes of Darby Racing, Proven Thoroughbreds and Australian Bloodstock.

“You have to put a lot on the line and spend a lot of money and put yourself in a lot of debt to get yourself up there, but we backed ourselves in, which has paid off,” Bennett said.

“We try and outdo what we’ve done the season before and so far, we’ve done that every year by prizemoney. We’re well on the way this year, I think we did just over $4 million last year and this year we’re already at $3.5 million.

“We do the hard yards, we find the nice horses and now people have got belief in us.”

With horses in some of best stables across the country, a hard-working attitude and most importantly, results on the track, it’s safe to say the the best is yet to come for Bennett Racing.