Pure joy for Hercock and Millar in Hastings sprint

[Wandering Eyes]

New Plymouth trainer Janelle Millar and red-hot rider Kate Hercock combined with underrated mare Pure Incanto to take out the first feature on the card at Hastings, the Listed Power Turf Sprint (1200m).

The six-year-old daughter of Per Incanto had finished fourth in a blanket finish to the Listed Lightning Handicap (1200m) at Trentham at her last start to narrowly miss adding some valuable black-type to her career record, but more than made amends on Saturday with a courageous performance.

Hercock, who rode four winners at Woodville on Easter Monday, had Pure Incanto stalking pacemaker La Bella Beals throughout before making her challenge rounding the home corner.

Pure Incanto drove to the lead at the 200m and despite being hotly challenged by race favourite Not Guilty and the late-finishing Nod Of The Head, she refused to yield as she clung to a half-length margin and the victory.

Millar had been confident of a good run from her charge who has managed to find bad luck in a number of her fourteen career starts to date.

“She was drawn perfectly (2) and she did exactly what we wanted to do, which was to go forward,” Millar said.

“We hoped to get the trail, settle and then kick and that’s what she did.

“She has been one of the unluckiest horses and very hard to train as she is not the soundest, so we have to choose our races carefully.

“Days like today, with just 53kgs on her back, she was more than capable and great for her to pull it off.”

Bred by the Little Avondale Trust, Pure Incanto was having just start number fifteen for her large group of owners and has now won over $68,000 in prizemoney.

She is out of the Stravinsky mare Rites Of Spring and is a younger half-sister to seven-race winner Brah Spring and becomes the 28th individual stakes winner for her Little Avondale-based sire, Per Incanto.

Her granddam is the prolific mare Sound Lover, the dam of well performed Hong Kong galloper Trillion Win, former top sprinter/miler Magnum and stakes winners Philosophe, Sir Lovesalot and Men At Work.

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