Four Japanese Horses For Championships
- Monday, 08 February 2016 07:33
Japanese horse Tosen Stardom will make his second visit to Sydney as one of four runners from his country entered for The Championships.
After finishing second in the 2015 Group One Ranvet Stakes, Tosen Stardom ran fifth in the $4 million Queen Elizabeth Stakes.
He will be accompanied by his Yasutoshi Ikee-trained stablemate Tosen Reve who will be aimed at either the Sydney Cup or the Queen Elizabeth.
The other two intended runners from Japan are last year's champion three-year-old colt Isla Bonita and dual Group One winner Logotype.
The quartet will be housed at Canterbury Racecourse which will be a quarantine centre when they arrive.
"The Championships is now firmly entrenched on the world stage after just a couple of years," Racing NSW chief executive Peter V'landys said.
All up there were 1290 nominations taken for the 10 races that constitute The Championships over two Saturdays at Randwick on April 2 and 9, 69 more than last year.
The biggest increase in nominations came in the $2.5 million TJ Smith Stakes (1200m) with 91, up 32 per cent.
"The Championships with record nominations this year goes to another level, and we are especially excited at a horse such as Winx taking on some of the world's strongest middle-distance horses from Japan," Australian Turf Club chief executive Darren Pearce said.
