Emerging three-year-olds by Westbury Stud resident Swiss Ace have stamped themselves as a pair to follow with impressive last-start winning performances.
Breeder Gerry Harvey’s familiar blue and white silks were successful aboard debut runner Brave Spirit on the all-weather track at Cambridge while Fast Serve remained undefeated following his most recent outing in Hong Kong.
Trained by Shaun Ritchie and Colm Murray, Brave Spirit had won both of his latest trials and carried that form over to race day with a minimum of effort.
“Brave Spirit was extremely impressive in his trials and that was never going to be missed. We thought he was our best chance of the day,” Ritchie said.
He sat in second spot off the fence for rider Michael McNab before taking control at the top of the straight and forged clear to score by a comfortable length at the end of 1300 metres.
Brave Spirit is the second winner for the Big Brown mare Spirit Of Joy, who is from the family of the Group 1 Australasian Oaks winner Leica Smile, and she has an unraced juvenile filly by Reliable Man and is in foal to Redwood.
Fast Serve was bred by Bruce Lourie and won a trial at Cambridge last year from Clinton Isdale’s stable before joining Mitch Freedman at Ballarat.
He was successful in two more trials and was then purchased by clients of David Hall, who gained an early return when he won at his Hong Kong debut and followed up again over 1000 metres, breaking 57sec both times.
“He’s got such a high cruising speed, so it’s really nice to see him quicken under me which he never did at his first start,” rider Luke Ferraris said.
“Obviously, he was green that time and he was again, you saw him hit the inside fence, but he’s starting to do things right and as long as he continues on this trajectory, it’s pretty exciting for him.”
Fast Serve is out of the Red Giant mare Nahele, who is back in foal to Swiss Ace.