Two starts for two wins. An impressive start for the career of filly Dixie Star.
The Stephen Boyd trained Bettor’s Delight three year old lead and held on to win the $12,000 ILT Nugget Final at Ascot Park today.
“It’s great having races like this, a good incentive to come down,” Boyd said.
Dixie Star was bought at the 2017 Sale of the Stars for $8,000 and is out of the five win McArdle mare Dixie Belle. This is the Black Watch family that has produced many good fillies, like Star Of The Ball and Pembrook’s Delight.
Since her last win at Winton on February 17th Boyd has kept Dixie Star ticking over.
“We don’t do much with her at home so it was a natural improvement really. She only has the hopple runs. It seems to be working. She’s fit enough and wasn’t blowing when she came back.”
In today’s feature Northern reinsman David Butcher took her straight to the front and she showed gameness to beat off all challengers, beating the favourite Burlington by three quarters of a length.
Dixie Star winning the Nuggets – Photo Bruce Stewart
“Richard Bull, one of my owners, is a good friend of David’s and he arranged for him to come down.”
Winning connections – Photo Bruce Stewart
Boyd is now eying up the Ladyship Final for Dixie Star on March 16th at Wyndham.
“We’ll definitely come down for the Southland Oaks as well.”
Boyd says he has thirty horses in work.
“I break in a lot of horses for Mark Purdon and Natalie Rasmussen so we don’t have many racehorses.”
Stephen has held a license for eighteen seasons and has trained in total, twenty two winners. Eleven of those wins have happened this season, four of them in Southland.
“I got out of it for a while and drove a courier truck but Dad (John) got sick so I came back to help the business.”
His father does all the freeze branding for all the horses in the South Island and he also held a trainers license. Two of the better horses he trained were Dainty Smooth, the winner of seven and Dainty Judy which won six.
Stephen Boyd’s first training win was at Westport in March 2000 when Smokey Range which he drove, won.
Bruce Stewart