Blue collar millionaire Trust In A Gust made it two Group 1
wins in two weeks when grinding his opponents into the ground in Saturday's $400,000
Group 1 Toorak Handicap (1600m) at Caulfield.
Tacking the lead at the point of the turn when Solicit put
up the white flag, Trust In a Gust looked certain to be run down in the final
stages but found a second wind under Brad Rawiller and looked good value for
his three-quarter of a length over Speediness with Desert Jeuney a half-neck
back in third (photo Darryl Sherer).
A last start winner of the Group 1 Sir Rupert Clarke Stakes,
Trust In A Gust earned a small fortune in VOBIS Gold bonuses before being asked
to take on stakes class. He was crowned the Super VOBIS Horse of the Year for
2013/2014.
A $45,000 Inglis Premier purchase by his trainer Darren Weir
from the Swettenham Stud draft at the second session of the 2012 Inglis Premier
Yearling sale, Trust in a Gust becomes Australia's latest equine millionaire.
His overall record stands at 10 wins, 4 seconds and 1 third from 17 starts for
earnings of $1,109,650.
Despite signing the ticket for Trust In The Gust, Darren
Weir made special mention of highly successful bloodstock agent John Foote for
picking out the son of Keep The Faith.
"What a ride. What a great horse to train, sound, tough
and makes his own luck and he's the perfect sort of horse for what trainers are
looking for," Weir said.
"He puts himself in the race on the corner and toughs
it out in the straight. He's a pleasure to train. We always knew he was quite a
good galloper but to get to this level was a surprise.
"We brought him in for the spring not knowing where we
were going to end up but it's been a great ride so far. It took us a long time
to win a Group I (in Victoria) and now we've got a couple with a great little
horse."
Weir said the Group I Emirates Stakes (1600m) at Flemington
could be a suitable target for the 4yo entire.
Bred by Adam Sangster, Trust in a Gust is the lone Group I
winner for Sunday Silence sire Keep the Faith, who stood at Swettenham Stud
before his transfer to Greta West Stud in 2012 where he stands this spring at a
fee of $4,400.
Trust In A Gust comes from his fourth crop and things may
have been different for Keep The Faith if he had come in the first.
By the time Trust In a Gust began his illustrious career,
Keep The Faith was on the slide, covering just 17 mares in 2011, 58 (2012), 34
(2013).
A strikingly handsome son of the multiple champion stallion
in Japan, Sunday Silence, Keep The Faith was a talented racehorse. In a light
career of nine starts he was a Listed winner at Caulfield defeating Our Smoking
Joe.
His fee this season at Greta West Stud has been set at
$4,400.
