Allez without fanfare

Two horses have just left Bart Cummings’ Flemington stables, Saintly Place. One went with great fanfare and gnashing of teeth amid tears of sorrow; the other slipped quietly away with a rub on the nose and a pat on the rump for a job well done.

While all the attention has been on champion So You Think’s sale to the Coolmore conglomerate, Group 1 winning mare Allez Wonder retired her racing gear without much as a murmur.

Whereas the Cummings team is rueing the fact that there is a lot of unfinished business with So You Think who,despite winning two Cox Plates, is still well short of reaching his peak, Allez Wonder left nothing else to do on the track.

Cummings, in his true style, got the absolute out of the daughter of Redoute’s Choice. Her crowning moment came when she sneaked along the rails and between horses late to win the 2009 Group 1 Toorak Handicap (1600m) at Caulfield.

It was only the third win for Allez Wonder, and she hasn’t run a place in 10 starts since – eight at Group 1 level – for her owners, including Dato Tan Chin Nam and the queen of racing’s Twitter world, Su-Ann Khaw (better known as @inkmarksofsu), whose syndicate, Suez Thoroughbreds Pty Ltd, manages the mare.

In keeping with how much Allez Wonder is valued by her owners, there is no rush to have her covered by a stallion in November. She’s off to a leisurely life in a lush paddock to rest and let down for the 2011 breeding season.

No stallion has been selected, but the options for this valuable mare are endless. Maybe she is waiting for her boyish beau, So You Think, to retire to Coolmore in NSW next year. It’s a perfect match.

I have seen many better Group 1 winning mares than Allez Wonder, but the fact she achieved a high level on the racetrack is a great tribute to her and her trainer. She is a mare who needed the cards to fall for her in her races, as they did when Michelle Payne steered her home in the Toorak.

She is a finicky mare. She didn’t like a bit of spit on the track, nor did she like a slow pace, and to push to her out of the gate early usually meant a stubborn reaction at the end of her races. But on her good days she was good.

She had proven herself at Group 1 level as a 3YO filly,  when she charged home to finish third behind the champion Samantha Miss in the Crown Oaks (2500m, Flemington), and in the 2009 autumn looked a serious Group 1 AJC Oaks (2400m, Randwick) prospect after winning the Listed Nolen Classic (1600m) at Kembla Grange. But wet tracks saw her flop in the Group 1 Storm Queen Stakes (2000m, Rosehill) and the Oaks.

In the stable, and on the social networks, Allez Wonder was called “baby girl” … this girl has grown up and it’s time to become a mother.

Photo: Allez Wonder (Michelle Payne) parading before the 2009 Group 1 Caulfield Cup.