Family pride and memories of one of the greats in New Zealand racing history came flooding back to Cambridge woman Liz Wallace when Yardarm won the AHD Hawke’s Bay Steeplechase at Hastings last Saturday.
Yardarm’s name underlines his connection to Hall of Fame galloper Mainbrace, drawing on the old sailors’ adage ‘It’s time to splice the mainbrace when the sun is over the yardarm’. Liz Wallace is the mother of Yardarm’s owner-breeders Michael and Simon Wallace, and the 11-year-old races in the red Fraser tartan colours made famous in the early 1950s by Mainbrace.
The feisty chestnut, bred and raced by Liz Wallace’s father Bob Nolan and his cousin, Hamilton doctor Tom Fraser, won 23 of his 25 starts. Seventeen of those wins were in succession and it was generally accepted that, but for an untimely defeat in his first start at three, Mainbrace would have surpassed the 19-straight record shared by early 20th Century champions Gloaming and Desert Gold.
“Seeing Yardarm win, it was such a thrill. I was so pleased for my two boys to win a race like that with a horse carrying their grandfather’s colours,” Wallace told RaceForm as she relived the excitement. “It brought it all back to me, even watching the young jockey (James Seivwright) bringing the horse back in, I was wondering if he had any idea of the history attached to those colours.”
Like Mainbrace, Yardarm is a chestnut, and even though he hails from a different line, he still has some of the champion’s blood coursing through his veins. His fourth dam Topaz was by Mainbrace and she in turn can take the credit as the dam of the last top class horse bred and raced by Bob Nolan, the 1982 Auckland Cup winner Chimbu.
“Tom Fraser owned Mainbrace’s dam Maneroo but he was having problems breeding from her, so he handed her over to my father hoping he might get a foal. Dad sent her to Admiral’s Luck, who Jim and John Malcolm were standing at Te Rapa Stud, and what do you know, that produced the foal that became known as Mainbrace!
“My father always intended letting Tom have a share if the mare produced a foal, which is how they came to race Mainbrace together. I wasn’t very old at the time, but I can still remember my parents arriving home from a day at the races with yet another trophy – they were wonderful times!”
Having completely dominated his hapless rival The Unicorn and all other three-year-olds in the 1950-51 season, Mainbrace returned the following spring to win his first two starts, after which an unprecedented offer of US$150,000 was made for the champion colt. His last race had been on a very heavy track, but that took its ultimate toll, causing an injury in his hindquarters that was to see him fail the veterinary examination that was part of the sale deal and which ultimately ended his career.
Mainbrace was retired to Te Rapa Stud, where he met with moderate success before returning to the Nolan farm south of Cambridge at Roto-o-Rangi.
“It wasn’t fashionable to support what were then known as ‘colonial’ stallions,” Wallace recalls. “He ended up back on the farm and he continued to cover mares, but my memories of him are riding past his paddock on our way over the farm and seeing this horse who was still magnificent well into his later years.”
There’s further racing history in this tale, through the origins of the family that produced Chimbu and now Yardarm. Chimbu’s dam Topaz was a grand-daughter of the Foxbridge mare Duvach, from whom the former men’s hairdresser George Cobb had bred the 1947 Melbourne Cup winner Hiraji.
The first Matamata-based trainer to win the national premiership when he claimed the 1945-46 title, Cobb was inspired by Duvach’s achievements to name his property Duvach Lodge. The same farm is still producing winners under the Blandford Lodge banner.
Back to the present, the Hawke’s Bay Steeplechase win by Yardarm is testimony to patience and perseverance. Simon Wallace has lived for the past 16 years in Brazil, where he is a partner in the premium milk supplier Leitissimo incorporating New Zealand dairy farming practices, while his brother Michael holds an owner-trainer’s licence and is based on a part of the original Nolan farm.
Identifying Yardarm as a potential jumper, they placed him with Mark Brooks, who prepared him for a maiden hurdle win at just his second start in that role in 2015. He didn’t complete the course in his next start and wasn’t to reappear for nearly two years, finishing close seconds in the 2017 Waikato and K S Browne Hurdles. He was then taken to Victoria, only to be narrowly denied in the Crisp Steeples at Sandown and the Grand National Steeplechase at Ballarat.
Long absences became a continuing theme in Yardarm’s career, as evidenced by another two years on the sideline before two unplaced starts back in New Zealand in 2019, followed by yet another protracted layoff and a relocation to Kevin Myers in deference to leg issues that had become part of his makeup. Three starts into his current campaign he finished fourth in a steeplechase at Trentham last month, followed by his Hastings breakthrough.
“The only disappointment is that Michael and Simon couldn’t be there on Saturday,” says their mother. “Michael tried to make it happen but he had to be back to tend to his horses, and of course it was impossible for Simon.
“We used to see a lot of each other with him and his wife coming back home or me going over to Brazil, but with the Covid situation that hasn’t happened for a while. It’s been really hard on us all, especially when they’ve got a baby daughter, and we’ve had to make do with connecting online. What I’d give for a real cuddle!
“I talked to Simon soon after the race on Saturday and even though he couldn’t watch it live, he was able to see the video soon afterwards.
“We’re not sure where Yardarm is going to race next, but wherever that might be, one way or another we’ll all be watching.”
