Tony & Maddysen Sears have had a total of 23 starters in listed races for zero wins, but newly crowned stable star Yellow Brick is attempting to change that in Saturday’s Magic Millions 3yo Guineas (1425m) worth $2 million.
A restricted listed race by nature, the quality, stature, and prize money would mean a lot more for the father-daughter training duo, who have done a remarkable job with the $20,000 purchase in the 2021 Yearling Sales.
A last start winner of Toowoomba’s newest slot race, The King Of The Mountain against the older horses, Yellow Brick has now won five from six and Maddysen Sears believes racing out of his age group will prove beneficial.
“It’s a big difference when a horse comes back to its own age group… younger horses against old, campaigned horses is very hard to win,” Sears said.
While Toowoomba racing may not typically measure up to a Magic Millions feature, the clock doesn’t lie, and neither do the horses behind Yellow Brick.
“Yes, it’s a different sort of race but he did break the track record and we do have the Weetwood (Handicap, Listed) and those sort of races over the 1200m at Toowoomba so I think the win had a lot of merit to it,” Sears said.
To further enhance the form from a Magic Millions perspective, the second horse was Alpine Edge, who ran 2nd to Shaquero in the 2021 Magic Millions 2yo Classic.
Jumping from barrier 10/11 at Toowoomba, Yellow Brick was able to get across and sit outside the leader, but Sears, who is also in the ownership group, wanted an inside barrier and came up trumps at Tuesday morning’s barrier draw with barrier 5.
“You’ve got a couple of horses in there that always sit up on the speed like Soothsayer, Spiritualised and our horse… he did jump from 10 in the King Of The Mountain so he can overcome a bad barrier,” Sears said.
As for the horse himself, the camp are confident they’ve got the right animal peaking at the right time to deliver by far the training duo’s biggest career win.
“He’s come on really well, he’ll have a gallop Tuesday morning with Steady Ready, they work really well together… he’ll do a little bit on his own on Thursday, but we couldn’t have him any more primed and ready to go for the race.”