Tim O'Connor
Major Delight once again showed us her greatness with an outstanding performance to defend her Breeders Crown title at Melton on Saturday night.
The star daughter of Bettors Delight completed a clean sweep of the pacing finals for trainer Emma Stewart when she sat parked to stablemate Joyful and charged clear of her in the home straight to win the showdown for three-year-old fillies.
Mark Pitt has been the horse’s driver throughout her 19 career starts and struggled to add any more superlatives to the Major Delight conversation.
“She ticks all the boxes and I can’t praise her any more than what she’s been praised,” Pitt said.
“She can be very tricky and very unpredictable with the way she races, but she raced super tonight and when it was time to go, she meant business.
“I just think the better horses she races, the better she will race herself too. I can’t wait for her to come back and bring on the next season with her.”
Major Delight has drawn comparisons to Ladies In Red for her amazing two and three-year-old seasons, and actually has a better career record than the millionaire mare after their back-to-back Breeders Crown triumphs.
Owner-breeder Peter Gleeson’s pacer has now won 16 races, four Group 1s and almost $600,000 in prizemoney as she heads for a well-earned break.
Earlier, Very Pretty overcame a flat tyre in the home straight to extend her unbeaten record to five starts with success in the Pebble Beach Breeders Crown final for two-year-old fillies.
Pitt went straight to the front with the daughter of American Ideal and she never looked in any danger until Lux Aeterna clipped her wheel approaching the home straight. But, despite the blowout, Very Pretty had enough of a margin on her rivals and coasted home to score by over 4m.
“She was super, especially with that fast 43 (second) lead time. It can take a lot out of these babies, but she showed us how good she is,” Pitt said.
New South Wales reinsman Luke McCarthy made a flying visit to Victoria and teamed up with Perfect Class to win the Woodlands Stud ‘Lather Up’ Breeders Crown final for three-year-old colts and geldings.
An early mistake from favourite and stablemate Oliver Dan prompted some fireworks, with four different leaders inside the formative stages of the race. Perfect Class proved the last of those and from there was never headed on his way to victory over fellow peg-line runners Final Collect and Little Louie.
David Moran and Timmy Rictor kick-started the Stewart-trained Quaddie when they found the front and sizzled home in a 55.2sec last half to beat Some American and The Bigboss.
The result completed a flawless IRT Breeders Crown series for two-year-old colts and geldings, with the son of Modern Art winning his heat, semi-final and final throughout November.
