Ourforeignminister heading for Merial Mile

Ourforeignminister heading for Merial Mile

By Phillip Quay

Richard Otto and Mark Brooks-trained Ourforeignminister is now heading for a start in the Group 3 $70,000 Merial Mile at Awapuni on Saturday week (September 10).

At his last start Ourforeignminister won the Interprovincial Challenge at New Plymouth.

Otto said Ourforeignminister had come through the New Plymouth win in fine order.

Otto has previously won the Merial Mile in 2008 with Old Belvedere.

Otto is among the gelding's owners along with his brother and former training partner, Chris.

The Interprovincial win capped a great start to the training career of Mark Brooks who joined up with Otto at the beginning of this season.

Brooks had previously been involved in breaking and pre-training and more recently as a private trainer for Waikato Stud.

The Te Awamutu combination celebrated their first winner when Just Gordon was successful at the Te Awamutu mid-week meeting earlier in the month.

Ourforeignminister has been rated highly by Otto for some time and it came as no surprise that he beat a quality field in the New Plymouth feature, when ridden by Danielle Johnson.

Ourforeignminister was purchased for $100,000 as a yearling at a Melbourne sale and has now earned $64,312.

The Dubai Destination five-year-old has now won four of his 17 starts. His victory at New Plymouth was scored by three-quarters of a length from Kalgoorlie Bomber. In third place was The Muffin Man.

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