Mizzy overcomes injury misfortune and now Cummings plots Group 1 for mare
Trainer mulls options for daughter of Zoustar after wide Coolmore barrier draw
Mizzy (Zoustar) is no certainty to run in today’s Coolmore Classic (Gr 1, 1500m) from a wide barrier as trainer Anthony Cummings looks to maximise what could potentially be the mare’s final racing campaign, now that she has regained form after a long injury layoff.
The talented mare raced just once last calendar year before Cummings and his co-owners’ had their patience rewarded this preparation with the five-year-old’s gallant second in last Saturday’s Canterbury Stakes (Gr 1, 1300m) at Randwick, her third start back from a spell.
“She strained a hamstring and had an ischial tuberosity fracture, which is where the hamstring attaches to the pelvic bone, and that put her out for a while,” Cummings explained to ANZ Bloodstock News yesterday.
“When she came back (last August-September) she was a bit big. We did some work for her and it just wasn’t the right preparation for her to go to the races.
“She had one run and then went back to the paddock. She’s had two four-month holidays to get over it completely and in the right shape and have a good racing prep.”
Cummings’ aspiration is to retire Mizzy as a Group 1 winner, but barrier 15 in today’s race at Rosehill has put a spanner in the works.
“In terms of mares’ Group 1s, the ones that are coming up is the one at Randwick (Coolmore Legacy), you have got the Tatts Tiara in Queensland and the Sangster in Adelaide, so it is just a matter of seeing what she does, and whether 1400 to 1600 metres is looking most likely to produce a result,” he said.
“I thought the Coolmore was the best option going in, and it still looks like it is despite the barrier, but we have the choice of holding back and waiting for the George Ryder next week, which on her last run, wouldn’t be silly, so we will just assess it all and work out what we do.”
A $200,000 Inglis Australian Easter Yearling Sale graduate, the Robert Crabtree-bred Mizzy is a daughter of, as the name suggests, the former Cummings-trained Missy Cummings (Magnus), a winner of three of her four starts which included a James Carr Stakes (Listed, 1400m) victory in her one and only racing preparation as a three-year-old.
Crabtree retains a share in Mizzy, whose first three dams are all stakes winners, under his Dorrington Farm banner while the trainer himself is also a co-owner.
Mizzy, who ran fourth in the 2019 Coolmore Classic behind Dixie Blossoms (Street Sense) as a three-year-old and returned later that year to win three Group races in succession, two of them at Rosehill, before finishing third in the Silver Eagle (1300m) and the $7.5 million Golden Eagle (1500m). So far, she has won more than $1.5 million in prize-money in her 22-start career.
“We are talking about her going through a sale this year in one of the various mares sales that are around, but it is form dependent,” he said.
“If she races well enough we might race on for another 12 months. Having basically lost 12 months through injury, it wouldn’t be an unreasonable thing to do and in the form she’s in, it would be fairly lucrative as well, I’d say.”
If Cummings elects to take his chances with Mizzy in the Coolmore, Regan Bayliss will take the ride on the mare.
“She came out of that (Canterbury Stakes) run in great shape and, if anything, she looks to have improved. I am happy with her.” he said.
“You can have plans A, B, C and D but they all go out the window when the barriers open, so you have just got to hope it works out.”
Cummings, meanwhile, will also have promising two-year-old colt Tristate (Headwater) start in the Pago Pago Stakes (Gr 3, 1200m) in a last-ditch bid to make the Golden Slipper Stakes (Gr 1, 1200m) field next week.
The colt was ordered back to the barrier trials by Racing NSW stewards after a wayward last-start performance in the Skyline Stakes (Gr 2, 1200m), a race won by O’President (Fastnet Rock).
“He was a little bit erratic at Randwick last start, but Nash (Rawiller) just changed his mind halfway around the bend and it got the horse off balance and the horse didn’t recover in time to get it right,” Cummings said.
“We had to go back to the trials and he trialled well and he goes into this race in good shape.”