Shooting To Win reached double-figures for individual black-type winners when Dom To Shoot arrived in time to score a neck victory in the G3 Northam Stakes (1300m) on Sunday.
Dom To Shoot is the 10th Stakes winner for the Oakland Park Stud resident and it won’t be the last at that level this season. He stormed home to defeat Comfort Me (Playing God) and Red Can Man (Gingerbread Man) in the Avon Valley’s feature sprint for premier jockey Willie Pike and owner-breeder Wally Daly.
“I didn’t think he could win at the top of the straight but he’s been a ripper for the stable and is probably going as good as ever,” co-trainer Jake Casey said. “Early on, he was doing a few things wrong and getting himself beat but now he is a real professional. I can’t fault him and we’re looking forward to going on with him.”
Photo / Western Racepix
Further Group 3 assignments include the Belmont Sprint (1400m), Hyperion Stakes (1600m) and Strickland Stakes (2000m) during the winter season at Belmont. “He’s been a ripper for the stable and the longer races going forward are only going to suit him better.”
Pike knew he would settle back in the field but was banking on a cart into the race. “I thought we could track into it and come down the middle of the track,” he told the West Australian Newspaper. “But that just wasn’t on the cards today. The three-wide line was struggling a long way from home so I had to cut the corner and hope for the best.”
Dom To Shoot (5g Shooting To Win – Princess Rouge by Pins) is out of a Stakes-placed full-sister to Pin Rouge (LR Bunbury Stakes) and Daly had Princess Rouge covered by Playing God last September.
Starring Knight completed a running double for Shooting To Win at Northam in a heat of the Sky Racing Provincial Championships (1300m). The Pearce Racing galloper came from a seemingly impossible position on the corner and, on that performance, will be the horse to beat in the Provincial Final at Belmont on May 20.
Starring Knight (4g Shooting To Win – Hi On Love by Love A Dane) is one of seven winners from a G3 Champion Fillies Stakes (1600m) winning half-sister to G1 Winterbottom Stakes winner Barakey (Key Business).
Pearce Racing had landed the first-leg of their own Oakland Park double at Northam with Climb On Top (Demerit) in the Afgri Equipment Hcp (1100m). A homebred for Oakland Park’s Neville & Susan Duncan, he proved a dominant debut victory at Pinjarra last month was no fluke when finishing powerfully to claim race-favourite Sisu Warrior in a tight photo-finish.
Climb On Top (3g Demerit – Time To Climb by Bearcat) is the fourth and final winner from a mare who claimed the RL Magic Millions Perth 2YO Classic at Ascot in 2010. Her older half-brother Roman Time (Danetime) had won the G2 Karrakatta Plate and G3 WA Sires’ Produce Stakes in 2007.
Shooting To Win (Northern Meteor) is a half-brother to Deep Field and will be covering his second book at Oakland Park this year after initially standing at Darley Kelvinside in NSW.
