Carston celebrates winning treble

[Wandering Eyes]

Leading South Island trainer Andrew Carston continued his stellar run on his local polytrack surface when recording a winning treble at Riccarton on Thursday.

The local horseman was able to better his winning double performance at the venue from two weeks prior when Dame County (NZ) (Contributer), The Arctic Blast (NZ) (Ocean Park) and Proper Twelve (NZ) (Vadamos) each broke maiden status for the stable.

Carston started the day off well with a perfect ride from jockey Kylie Williams in behind the speed guiding Dame County to victory in the first, the Riccarton Function Centre Maiden 2200m.

The Contributor mare has appreciated the step-up over ground in recent races and Carston said he took his time to build her up to the distance and was rewarded on the synthetic surface.

“She’s been building to a win, we leased her off Mapperley Stud and my old boss Mark Walker used to train her and told me she would do a good job down here,” Carston said.

“She’s gone good races all the way through and it’s nice to top it off with a win, she deserved it.”

A son of Ocean Park, The Arctic Blast gave the stable a race-to-race double when overpowering the Lance Robinson-trained In Awe to score by half a head for jockey Kavish Chowdhoory in the Speights Summit Ultra On Tap Maiden 1600m.

Carston had hoped a breakthrough for the four-year-old was approaching after a luckless third a fortnight prior at Riccarton Synthetic behind stablemate Peut Respirer.

“He’s been a frustrating horse, I’m surprised he hasn’t won a race until now,” he said.

“He seemed to have come up really well this preparation, and his first-up run suggested he’d run well today and he delivered. It’s been a long time coming.”

A stable quinella by Proper Twelve and Peace Lover in the National Breeding Stock Sale on Gavelhouse Plus – Ends 12 July Maiden 1200m brought up the winning treble for Carston, with the Vadamos four-year-old appreciating the step back to the 1200m.

“Proper Twelve is a hard going horse, he’s gone pretty honest races since I’ve had him so it’s rewarding to win a race with him,” Carston said.

“I was really happy with the second horse (Peace Lover) as well, she’s a nice filly whose gone two good races so she’s going close to winning a race too.”

Fortunately for Carston, all three winning runners at the Thursday meeting will be back in Special Conditions maiden company in two weeks’ time with MAAT races at Riccarton Synthetic the next target for the trio.

“Horses that win on the poly seem to continuously run well on the poly, so absolutely we’ll be back for another go,” Carston said.

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