The WA autumn carnival is about to hit top gear in coming weeks with a slew of Group races and the $5million Quokka and the state’s best stallion Playing God got in early with a new stakes-winner last Sunday.
Tough Playing God gelding Currimundi avenged a last start Bunbury Cup defeat and scored a determined victory in the Listed Pinjarra Cup (2300m).
The six year old has raced in stakes company for much of his 41 start career, but has found his niche as a country Cups performer.
A homebred for Albany trainer Steve Wolfe, Currimundi is a half-brother to stakes-placed The Spruiker and is out of winning miler Pins Perhaps (Pins). He is one of only two foals she left before an untimely demise - both of which have earned black type, underlying the sad loss of a valuable broodmare.
Western Australia’s reigning Champion Sire Playing God continues to demonstrate his extraordinary consistency as a sire of versatile stakes class gallopers.
The Darling View resident already has seven stakes winners to his name this season, with 23 stakes winners overall,and that number is likely to increase as Perth's Autumn carnival rolls on.
Playing God maintains an impressive strike rate of 9% stakes winners to runners and in the mould of his sire Blackfriars, throws progeny that are keenly sought after for their soundness and temperament as well as ability.
Many are quality juvenile performers that train on and give their connections an enjoyable ride over a number of seasons.
At Pinjarra, Currimundi under regular jockey Shaun Mc Gruddy, came home from well off the pace to defeat Fear The Wind by a narrow margin in an exciting finish to the regional feature.
With this win Currimundi adds to his 2024 Albany Cup 2100m - Diggers Cup 1800m double. He was also runner up in the Northam Cup 1600m last year and has the overall record of 11 wins and nine placings from 41 starts with prizemoney topping $750,000.
Currimundi comes from a tough New Zealand based family featuring Group I winners Sphenophyta, at one time a raging Melbourne Cup favourite and Moss Downs, who claimed New Zealand features the Kelt Capital Stakes and Easter Handicap amongst a haul of black type victories.
The family is a branch of the famous dynasty descending from taproot mare Manto (family 18) which since the earliest days of the studbook has supplied a stream of feature winners on both sides of the Tasman and is a family enjoying a great deal of the limelight on the Australian turf currently, as champion sire Written Tycoon hails from its ranks.
Playing God descends from a mare strongly inbred to family 18 which is doubtless one contributing factor to the genetic prepotency of this impressive stallion.
Playing God covered 136 mares last season at Darling View Thoroughbreds at a fee of $49,500.
