A tremendous in-depth story by Trevor Marshallsea @ANZ_News 2/10/25
Where do you start with the story of Piggyback?
It’s a tale with such a sprinkling of unexpected, strange and purely wild elements that - were this not racing and breeding - it’d be hard to believe.
She’s an Australian-bred stayer (no wait, there’s more!) - an Australian-bred stayer who after winning last Saturday’s Colin Stephen Quality (Gr 3, 2400m) goes in to wave the flag and battle a field of mostly European imports in Saturday’s The Metropolitan (Gr 1, 2400m) at Randwick.
PIG FLY'S - Piggyback out stays them in Gr3 Colin Stephen
And she’s a stayer by Trapeze Artist, that speedy son of speed sire Snitzel (Redoute’s Choice),
TRAPEZE ARTIST - Sire
who won his four Group 1’s from 1200 metres to 1400 metres.
The Metropolitan field has 18 starters and 14 of them are from Ireland, France or Britain.
Only three were bred in Australia - and two of those by Trapeze Artist!
Aside from $23 shot Piggyback, there’s Wagga Wagga Gold Cup (Listed, 2000m) winner Flying Bandit, at $19.
Trapeze Artist, now covering his seventh book at Widden Stud for $33,000 (inc GST) - down from $55,000 last year and an initial $88,000 - has sired 118 winners, from 202 runners.
TRAPEZE ARTIST - Sire
He’s only had four offspring even tried past 2200 metres, for two winners.
One is the five-year-old Piggyback, the other is another from the stallion’s first crop in Trapeze Torque, who’s also won at 2400 metres, in a Sunshine Coast Benchmark 58 in July. More on him later.
Further confounding conventional wisdom, Piggyback - trained by Ciaron Maher for Dynamic Syndications
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- is out of a mare by Choisir (Danehill Dancer), who had enough stamina to win seven races, between 1000 metres and 1200 metres.
And if you want to bend things further, she’s got the oft-dicey double Danehill (Danzig) in her pedigree, in the least desirable of the three possible ways you can execute that business - via two sons.
At least it’s more diluted than some Danehill duplications, at 4m x 4m, via Snitzel’s sire Redoute’s Choice and Choisir’s dad Danehill Dancer.
Bred by Trapeze Artist’s breeder and owner Bert Vieira, Piggyback is out of a mare who has a fitting name in all of this: Wowee.
WOWEE as a broodmare
Vieira bought her off the track for $210,000, and ended up selling her before Piggyback started racing, for $30,000.
Breeders are often sanguine about such matters. You can’t keep ‘em all, the glorious uncertainty, and all that.
The colourful Vieira is cut from a different cloth.
“Do I regret selling her? Yes I regret selling her,” he tells ANZ News -It’s In The Blood.
“I bought her for $210,000. She didn’t show much so I sold her. Next thing you know, Piggyback comes out.”
Wowee’s first five sold foals included one that fetched $6,000 and another knocked down for a princely $3,500. He’s Piggyback’s full-brother incidentally, and he was retired as a three-year-old after five runs in the NSW bush highlighted by a ninth at Dubbo. To give him his due, he was tenth on the turn!
Those first five sold foals netted a combined $171,500. And then last February, her next one fetched $170,000 - a colt for Wowee’s new West Australian owners, by Maschino (Encosta De Lago), who was among the top 15 lots at Magic Millions Perth.
By that stage, Piggyback was a Sydney city winner, having taken a 2000-metre Randwick Benchmark 72 as her third win in five starts. Still, that’s quite a turnaround for her mum as far as the sales ring goes.
As for Piggyback, her sale adds probably the most bizarre twist to this tale yet!
An early October foal, but something of an ugly duckling, she missed the main auctions, and was offered by Widden for Vieira at the Gold Coast National Yearling Sale.
She was purchased - for what Vieira calls a disappointing $32,000 - by a buyer identifying as Louis Bloodstock.
No one was sure who that was, but they would soon become familiar with the name, for Louis Bloodstock bought 21 of the next 87 lots via online bids.
All fillies, they cost a combined total just shy of $1 million.
The man behind the splurge was soon revealed as none other than Rob Ferguson, former Magic Millions part owner and Torryburn Stud owner.
And in a story which gained some notoriety, his spree was found to be drug-enhanced.
Well, who among us can’t say we haven’t bought a few things we didn’t need online on a big night - if perhaps not a million bucks worth?
The substance involved was innocent and legal, but it was shopping on steroids - literally.
For those who haven’t heard this ripping yarn, it transpired Ferguson, suffering from a lung condition, was in the midst of being taken off a course of the drugs by his doctor, the side-effects of which can be an experience of ‘invulnerability’. He sure shopped like it.
It was also revealed that each purchase brought him a feeling of great euphoria. He also had his dog at his feet, and that dog was called Louis.
“It was like having been at the Magic Millions bar all day and then deciding to buy some horses. It felt like a great idea at the time,” Ferguson told ANZ News at the time.
“It was just one of those things that happened. I’ll probably end up famous because of it.”
Ferguson awoke the next morning, possibly asked “What have I done?”, and decided to put his 22 fillies up for auction a couple of months later in a Magic Millions online sale, with reserves of half what he’d paid.
“When I purchased these fillies, I am sure I made a lot of vendors happy. This time around I will probably be making a lot of buyers happy,” he said, adding “it was never my intention to own these horses”.
Somewhere in Sydney, Dynamic Syndications’ father and son team Dean and Adam Watt, well versed in the capricious ways of this sport, exchanged a glance.
“When Dad and I read about the story, we just turned to each other and said, ‘You just know that one of these 22 is going to turn out to be a really good horse, and it will be a really good story’,” Adam tells It’s In The Blood.
Dynamic Duo - Adam & Dean Watt
“We just had to be the ones to find that horse.”
Fortunately for the Watts, their veterinarian Tim Roberts had been contracted by Magic Millions to vet “The Ferguson 22”.
PIGGYBACK a a yearling purchased by Dynamic Syndications for $27,000
They asked him to pick out a couple, then had another vet Greg Nash confirm those choices, and ultimately, they bought the filly who became Piggyback for - as expected - less than Ferguson had paid, at just $27,000.
Red Hot Lizzie a a yearling
The second of their pair, incidentally, was Red Hot Lizzie, a $10,500 buy who’s now a dual city winner.
Piggyback took her time. She debuted as a December three-year-old with a Gosford win over 1200 metres - more Trapeze Artist’s style - then spelled before winning her second start, at Orange.
PIGGYBACK winning on debut at Gosford
Piggyback winning over 2000m at Randwick
After that Randwick 2000-metre victory at start five, Maher tried her over 2500 metres at Flemington, for a decent fourth of 11, before another spell.
“She just didn’t come up in her next campaign last summer,” Watt said, as Piggyback managed two fifth placings and a sixth between December 2024 and February this year.
PIGGYBACK winning first-up over 1300m at Warwick Farm
This preparation, however, has been an upward spiral, starting with a 1300-metre Warwick Farm win in May, including a Randwick 2400-metre fourth five starts later, before a confidence-boosting 2200-metre Doomben victory in hot time at her following start,
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PIGGYBACK winning in fast Class record time over 2200m at Doomben
and into last Saturday’s Colin Stephen win - which was gained by 0.58 lengths.
Pig's can fly ! Piggyback was airborne winning the Gr3 Colin Stephen over 2400m at Rosehill
Piggyback has been up for a long time and will be spelled after Saturday, but already her connections can start dreaming big!
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Piggyback has a classical stayers physique
She’s now passed the first ballot clause for next year’s Melbourne Cup (Gr 1, 3200m) - winning a Group race over at least 2400 metres in the preceding two years - and so the Watts and co can entertain thoughts of not just having an Australian-bred stayer in the great marathon, but one by Trapeze Artist.
From whence does her staying power come?
The answer might be simple: Her second dam Zeal won only one of ten but was by that great stamina-bearer Zabeel (Sir Tristram).
That blood came through in Wowee, who won three from ten for John Sadler, becoming a stakes winner over distance at her last start in Morphettville’s SA Fillies Classic (Gr 3, 2500m).
What’s more, Trapeze Artist’s 2400-metre Sunshine Coast winner, Trapeze Torque, also has Zabeel, being out of a mare by his grandson Lonhro (Octagonal).
Trapeze Torque also has double-Danehill, at 4m x 3f (his second dam).
Gender balanced is statistically the best way to duplicate Danehill, but in Piggyback we find perhaps more for the “exceptions” file, regarding that double-male dodginess.
“Quite a lot of that double-Danehill cross really doesn’t work,” Watt says, “but for whatever reason, Choisir mares with Danehill-line stallions does work well.”
Piggyback has two other duplications in her first five generations, with a 5m x 4f of Lunchtime (Silly Season) and - how Australian is this? - a 5m x 5f of Biscay (Unfuwain), feeding strongly into the female lines of Trapeze Artist and Choisir.
The great blue hen Natalma (Native Dancer) is there in spades, with 11 mentions from columns six to nine, while influential British 1920s mare Selene (Chaucer) makes ten appearances, and Mumtaz Begum (Blenheim) six.
Hyperion (Gainsborough) is the most common stallion, with 18 spots in the first nine generations, one more than Nearco (Pharos) 17.
And so we take our learnings:
- Trapeze Artist can leave a stayer - his Group 1 winner had some stickability in being Caulfield Guineas (Gr 1, 1600m) hero Griff, after all;
- You can have double male Danehill if it’s through Choisir and;
- You shouldn’t buy horses on steroids!!!
This rollicking tale could also have another brilliant chapter to come, next spring.
“Imagine a daughter of Trapeze Artist out of a Choisir mare rolling around in a big two-mile race on the first Tuesday of November, taking on the international raiders?” Watt says.
“It’d be quite the story.”