Class Shines at Wyong

Boutique Hunter Valley farm Cressfield couldn’t sell this blue-blooded daughter of former star mare Our Egyptian Raine at the yearling sales and it’s proven a blessing in disguise with Egyptian Symbol taking out the Group III ATC The Nivison at Randwick back in October and booking her ticket for the Gold Coast in January with a dominant win in the $100,000 Three and Four Year Old event at Wyong on Thursday.

The talented daughter of ill-fated Stratum was having her first run back from a short let-up and proved far too good in surging clear from Brenton Avdulla to win the 1200 metre contest by a length and a half as favourite.

The victory has given her trainer Bjorn Baker added confidence in heading back to the Gold Coast on January 14 to make amends for a luckless third 12-months ago in the Magic Millions 3YO Guineas, when badly held-up in the straight behind Mahuta and Single Gaze.

“I think we have a little bit of unfinished business,” Baker told Sky Racing.

“She was a little bit unlucky in the 1400-metre race last year, the three-year-old race.”
Brenton Avdulla was also full of praise for Egyptian Symbol.

“She’s a talented mare,” Avdulla said. “She should have been giving them all five or six kilos minimum so I was confident if I just parked her wherever I wanted to be.

“She showed good gate speed to get across. We only went very steady in front which made it more of a dash home.

“She got around the bend really well and I was pretty kind to her.”

Egyptian Symbol will target the $1 million Magic Millions Fillies & Mares (1300m) at the Gold Coast on January 14.

Bred and retained by Bruce Neill’s Cressfield after passing in at the Magic Millions National Yearling Sale, Egyptian Symbol has won five of 13 starts earning just shy of $500,000 in prizemoney.

She is the best of five winners from former glamour mare Our Egyptian Raine, a Group I winner in New Zealand, who placed in no fewer than nine Group I races in Australia.

Our Egyptian Raine has a yearling colt by Zoustar that will be offered by Cressfield at Magic Millions as Lot 290.