Photo: Kenton Wright (Race Images)
After a formidable career competing at the highest level, Graham Richardson and Rogan Norvall’s star mare Bonny Lass has been retired from racing.
A daughter of Super Easy, Bonny Lass made an immediate impression when winning her first start as a juvenile, followed by the first of five Group victories in the Gr.2 Matamata Breeders’ Stakes (1200m). Her two-year-old campaign was completed by placings in the Gr.1 Sistema Stakes (1200m) and Gr.1 Manawatu Sires’ Produce Stakes (1200m).
At three, she won the Gr.3 Cambridge Breeders’ Stakes (1200m), a trend she continued into her four-year-old preparation when picking up the Gr.3 Sweynesse Stakes (1200m).
Like fine wine, Bonny Lass flourished with age and came desperately close to her elite-level breakthrough in the Gr.1 Railway (1200m) and Gr.1 Telegraph (1200m) last season, but that wait came to a triumphant end in the Gr.1 BCD Group Sprint (1400m), where she downed class galloper Crocetti to snatch top honours.
Opening her final season with a bang, Bonny Lass returned to Te Rapa and won the Gr.2 Foxbridge Plate (1200m), and after finishing eighth in the Gr.1 Railway (1200m) last Saturday, the curtain came down on a phenomenal 28-start career.
She earned just shy of $750,000 with eight wins, seven of those in the hands of her regular rider Craig Grylls.
For Richardson, few horses in his career compared to Bonny Lass.
“She was a natural from day one,” he said. “She won her first trial, she only had one, then she won her first start, and went straight into the Breeders’ Stakes and won that too.
“The only two horses to have won Group races at two, three, four, five and six are her and Melody Belle. I couldn’t be prouder.
“The BCD Sprint was absolutely the highlight, but her entire career was a highlight, she was just an unbelievable horse. She wasn’t always easy to ride, not nasty, but just very competitive and tried very hard.”
Out of a Le Bec Fin mare Posh Bec, Bonny Lass was never short of admirers on course, being the leading light for Brent and Wendy Cooper’s Social Racing Starting Gates Syndicate, who raced her alongside breeder Sandy Moore.
“Brent Cooper is a good friend, but he was also very good to deal with and we used to plan the horse’s programme together, which he loved doing,” Richardson said. “She’s going to be really missed.
“I don’t know what the plan of attack is now, but she’ll go back to Hallmark Stud, then Sandy Moore, who owns her, will decide that. Whether he will sell her or breed from her, I’m not sure, it’s all up in the air, but she’ll be looked after, which she deserves.”
