Star mares come of age in special weekend for Cambridge Stud

Within the space of less than 24 hours, Snazzytavi and Luberon secured valuable futures in the Cambridge Stud broodmare band with career-best victories at Te Rapa and Rotorua.
The first leg of the double came in Saturday’s relocated Gr. 1 Livamol Classic at Te Rapa, where the rapidly improving Snazzytavi faced the biggest test of her career and rose to the occasion superbly with a dominant win.
The following afternoon, multiple black-type placegetter Luberon won at stakes level for the first time with a similarly emphatic performance in the Gr. 3 Sweynesse Stakes at Rotorua.
“It was a wonderful couple of days for the stud,” CEO Henry Plumptre said from Sydney, where Joliestar is set to carry Brendan and Jo Lindsay’s black and gold colours in Saturday’s A$20 million The Everest.
“Both of those stakes wins came in the second-last races on the card, and we’d had a few misses earlier in the afternoon on both days. But in the races that really matter from a pedigree point of view, Snazzytavi and Luberon came good.”
The Livamol was the seventh win from just a 13-race career for Snazzytavi, and she boasts a perfect four-from-four record at Te Rapa. That obvious affinity for the Hamilton track convinced connections to take a shot at the 2040-metre feature, paving the way for Snazzytavi’s powerhouse come-from-behind victory by three and a half lengths.
“It was obviously a shame for Hastings that the race couldn’t be run there this year, but we had our doubts about taking her down there for that race,” Plumptre said. “She has a love affair with Te Rapa, which stood us in good stead. She’s won all of her starts there impressively and the circuit seems to suit her – particularly the nice, long straight where she can really let go.
“She’s been a work in progress but has been beautifully handled by Graham Richardson and Rogan Norvall, they’ve been very patient. She’s always had the ability, but didn’t really put her hand up until last season. Graham and Rogan took her quietly through the grades in that campaign, finishing with a dominant win in the Easter Handicap.
“She’s continued to improve from there and has managed to cap it all off with that enormously valuable Group One win.”
Snazzytavi will in time be a particularly special addition to the Cambridge Stud broodmare band, carrying on the legacy of her late sire Tavistock, who stood at the world-renowned nursery until his untimely death in 2019.
“Recent results have really reminded us again just what a loss Tavistock was,” Plumptre said. “He’s had back-to-back Group One winners in a week with Ceolwulf in the Epsom Handicap and now Snazzytavi.
“Although his progeny had a bit of a quiet patch just after he died, he’s really hit the board hard again in these last couple of years. We’re thrilled that we now have a Group One-winning daughter in our ranks.”
Snazzytavi is out of the Zabeel mare Ritzy Lady, who herself won six races including the Listed New Zealand St Leger. She was also runner-up in the Gr. 2 Counties Cup, and all of her five foals to race have been winners. Snazzytavi now clearly tops that list, while Le Societe placed in the Gr. 3 Cockram Stakes and is the dam of stakes performers Grand Pierro and Indiscretion.
Curraghmore principal Gordon Cunningham bred Snazzytavi under his Suncroft Bloodstock banner.
“Gordon is a great breeder,” Plumptre said. “I’ve been buying horses off him for 25 years now and have had a lot of luck with them.
“She was bred under a foal-share agreement. Gordon had Ritzy Lady and wanted her to go to Tavistock, and Scott Calder organised the mating. The mare produced this filly, and the original plan was for her to go to the yearling sales. She was withdrawn with a view to saving her for the Ready to Run, but then she was withdrawn from that sale too.
“Gordon said she was getting to the point where she had to go into work with someone, and he suggested Graham Richardson. The view at the time was that we would take her through to a trial, hopefully trial impressively and then see if we can sell her.
“But the long and short of it is that we went and had a look at her at Jamie Beatson’s property, and we really liked her. She was big, leggy, athletic – a fairly classic Tavistock. We waited to see how she went at the trials, and she trialled very well. We then agreed on a figure and bought Gordon out, and the rest is history.”
Luberon’s Sweynesse Stakes success was also enormously satisfying for the Cambridge Stud team. A first-crop flagbearer for the stud’s emerging sire Embellish, Luberon has now had 10 starts for five wins and two placings.
She became Embellish’s first winner in the spring of her two-year-old season, then credited him with his first black-type placing when she ran third in the Listed Counties Challenge Stakes. As a three-year-old last season, she added a third in the Gr. 2 Auckland Guineas and a fourth in the Gr. 1 New Zealand 1000 Guineas.
Embellish is now the sire of 23 winners from 56 runners, with Luberon sitting alongside Bold Soul as his second stakes winner. Bold Soul won last season’s Gr. 3 Chairman’s Stakes, Listed Tasmanian Derby and Listed Launceston Guineas.
“When a stallion kicks off at a $4,000 fee like Embellish did, they need a lot of early luck,” Plumptre said. “His first crop of three-year-olds produced a 2000 Guineas runner-up with Talisker while Luberon was fourth in the 1000 Guineas.
“He’s a good stallion who’s consistently sold well above his service fee, and I think his sire line of Sir Tristram, Zabeel and Savabeel carries a bit of currency for a stallion at the lower end of the market. He looks very much like his old man as well.
“Luberon is a beautiful homebred filly out of a Fastnet Rock mare that we bought off Graeme Rogerson. She’s always been a good-looking filly. She had a couple of issues as a three-year-old, but Lance Noble has been very patient.
“She has all the ability in the world when she puts it together, and hopefully she’s over her problems now. Lance’s plan is to keep her around six furlongs, which is a distance she seems to enjoy. I don’t think a top-three finish in a race like the Railway would be beyond her.”