Former Willie Mullins trainee Vauban (Fr) (Galiway {GB}) made the best possible start to his Southern Hemisphere career, eking out a narrow victory in the 2000-metre G3 Sky High Stakes at Rosehill on Saturday. The chestnut defeated Arapaho (Fr) (Lope De Vega {Ire}) (video).
Now trained by Gai Waterhouse and Adrian Bott for Australian Bloodstock after a reported A$2 million sale, the gelding was a two-time G1 Melbourne Cup starter for Mullins.
Bott was happy with the effort and Vauban is expected to point toward the G1 Tancred Stakes, which he has garnered favoritism.
“A 36 degree day today as well will help him acclimatise pretty quickly,” Bott said. “It's been a fantastic job for him. I guess he was probably meant to be at Cheltenham at the moment, it'd be much cooler there for him. It's amazing how he's come here and he obviously came over, well recognised in Australia starting as favourite in two Melbourne Cups.
“He obviously brought plenty of form and talent and ability from there. I wasn't sure how sharp we could get him and it's hard to gauge over the shorter trials here. I was really impressed by that today.
“I think today's been a real positive experience for him. I think he'll walk away with a lot of confidence off the back of that and I think we can see him continue to settle in and hopefully just adapt to the way of going down here.”
“We'll head to the Group 1 next start – the Tancred Stakes over 2400 metres. I think that'll be a great race for him and then we decide what we do off the back of that.”
Vauban is also early favourite for the 2025 Melbourne Cup.
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