Stratum Celebrates New Year’s Day With a Stakes-Winner

Golden Slipper winner Stratum is generally associated with his speedier offspring, but it was progressive staying mare Averau who provided him with a new stakes-winner on New Year’s Day when scoring a commanding win in the Listed VRC Bagot Handicap at Flemington.
The five year-old has been racing well for Peter Morgan and Craig Widdison since resuming from a spell in August last year and relished the marathon 2800 metre staying test to dash away for Linda Meech and win by more than three lengths.
“She’s such a fit horse and she just keeps on going,” said Peter Morgan.
“We don’t have to do much with her and she just keeps on keeping on, she’s a very good stayer.”
Averau may now target further Black Type in Tasmania over the summer months.
“She’s in the Hobart Cup and the Launceston Cup, we’ll just see how she comes through this,” Morgan added.
A $130,000 Inglis Premier purchase for Dean Hawthorne Bloodstock from the Grange Thoroughbreds draft, Averau has won six of 17 starts earning over $220,000 in prizemoney.
Averau was a successful pinhook for Grange Thoroughbreds, who bought her from Burnewang North for $48,000 from the Inglis Select Weanling Sale.
Bred by Cathy Hains’ Burnewang North, Averau is the best of two winners from unraced Viscount mare Merayaat, who comes from the family of Group I winners Universal Prince and Universal Queen.
Averau is the 26th stakes-winner for Stratum, who has 15 entries for Magic Millions 2015.