It was Ron Quinton's mares to the fore again as Dixie Blossoms overturned a last start defeat to Daysee Doom in the Group III Angst Stakes (1600m) at Randwick on Saturday.
Quinton quinellaed last month's Group II Golden Pendant (1400m) when Daysee Doom got the better of Dixie Blossoms but the result was reversed in their rematch back on home turf.
Dixie Blossoms was afforded a composed ride by Kerrin McEvoy as she gradually wore down her stablemate to win by three-quarters of a length on the line while the Les Bridge-trained Zenalicious ($17) was beaten the same margin back in third.
"They are two wonderful mares for us. It's a shame we've had to keep running them against each other but they've evened the score today," Quinton said.
"I'm very proud of both mares and they were ridden beautifully."
Last Thursday Quinton put a protracted cobalt investigation behind him after stewards cleared him of deliberately administering the substance to his horses.
Stewards concluded that the feed Quinton was using in his stable contained amounts of cobalt far excess of the amount indicated on the package labelling.
"It's a great weight off my shoulders. Naturally early on it was a big worry because we didn't know where it was coming from," Quinton said
"So it was a big relief when they started testing the feed and it was coming back with high levels of cobalt.
"Myself and my staff had done nothing wrong so we just had to stick to that."
With four weeks until the Group I Myer Classic (1600m) at Flemington, Quinton is yet to decide on the lead-up run for his mares but ruled out the Group III Tesio Stakes (1600m) at Moonee Valley on Cox Plate day.
"It's very likely they'll go to the Myer now. That's a month away this year so we'll work a plan out," Quinton said.
