Commanding Cambridge Win for Unequivocal (NZ)
12 June 2024
Pencarrow filly Unequivocal (NZ) (Eminent) capped a consistent run of form with a well-deserved and dominant victory in the $17,000 Riding for the Disabled Charity Day Maiden (2000m) at Cambridge.
The three-year-old went into Wednesday’s race winless in five career starts, but she had produced strong finishes on each occasion, dating right back to a pair of sixths in her first two appearances last spring.
Unequivocal returned to racing in the autumn with a fifth in April and two big late runs for second placings in May, and on Wednesday she broke through with an emphatic come-from-behind performance.
Unhurried out of the starting gates by jockey Michael McNab, Unequivocal sat in third-last for most of the race before beginning to warm up as the field made its way down the side of the track.
McNab began to drive her forward around the outside of the field just before the home turn, and she loomed ominously alongside the leaders at the top of the straight. Unequivocal quickly hit top gear from there and took command, clearing away to win by two and three-quarter lengths.
Unequivocal’s six-start career has now produced a win, two seconds, a fifth and two sixths. She has earned $16,040 in stakes. She is trained at Cambridge by Andrew Forsman.
Unequivocal was bred by Pencarrow Thoroughbreds Ltd and is raced by Sir Peter Vela, whose famous blue and white hooped colours were also worn by the winner’s sire Eminent.
Sir Peter Vela raced Eminent throughout a 14-start career that began in the United Kingdom with a victory at Newmarket as a two-year-old. He added the Group Three Prix Guillaume d’Ornano (2000m) at Deauville and Newmarket’s Group Three Craven Stakes (1600m) as a three-year-old, along with a third in the Group One Irish Champion Stakes (2000m) and a fourth in the Group One Epsom Derby (2400m).
An Irish-bred son of the legendary racehorse and superb sire Frankel, Eminent later travelled to Australia, where he ran second behind Avilius (Pivotal) in the Group One Ranvet Stakes (2000m) at Rosehill. Now he has made a promising start at stud, including three winners in the Pencarrow colours – Unequivocal and fellow three-year-olds Sunset Boulevard (NZ) and Uplifting (NZ).
Unequivocal is the first foal out of Philosophical (NZ) (Darci Brahma), who herself was a winner in the Pencarrow colours at Otaki in 2019.
Philosophical is a daughter of the stakes-winning Pencarrow mare Mirandola (NZ) (O’Reilly), whose dam Paolino (NZ) (Housebuster) won five times up to Group Two level and is a half-sister to the multiple Group winner and successful producer Sarwatch (NZ) (Jetball).
Philosophical’s second foal is an unnamed two-year-old filly by Tarzino (NZ), and she later returned to Eminent and produced a yearling filly born in the spring of 2022.