Evans’ pride at Skybird’s rise

The Ballarat trainer is still weighing up whether it or the following Saturday's Group 1 Oakleigh Plate (1100m) provides the best lead-in to the Group 1 Yulong Newmarket Handicap (1200m) on March 8.

But while 1000m is considered short of Skybird's best, her family has a history of running well in the race.

Skybird is by Exosphere, who started $3.10 in the 2016 Lightning but found himself in the wrong part of the track and had to settle for a 1-3/4-length fourth.

Her dam Real Desire is a daughter of 2010 Lightning runner-up Wanted and Waajib mare Forest Finch, who is a half-sister to Snippets' Lass, the dam of Snitzel, who ran in Takeover Target's Lightning.

That four-time Australian Champion Stallion is the sire of this year's Lightning favourite Switzerland.

Snitzel's sister Royal Snippets is the granddam of Private Eye, who pushed champion sprinting mare Imperatriz to a long head in last year's Lightning.

The connection to Snitzel is the main reason Anthony and Kristen Evans of Hunter Valley farm HP Thoroughbreds paid $18,000 for Real Desire online in 2018.

"It's a family that's just kept producing good horse after good horse," Anthony said.

"Since we bought Real Desire there's been four or five new Stakes winners on the page, through the likes of Private Eye.

"I just thought, for a small farm like us to have a mare closely-related to one of the best stallions of the last 20 or 30 years would be good and it seems to have worked out quite well."

Skybird is the third foal from Real Desire, whose first foal was Solvency (Unencumbered) won one of 17, followed by Forged, a brother to Skybird who also won one race.

Real Desire did not have a foal the year after Skybird, then produced a colt by Deep Field who Tony and Calvin McEvoy bought for $260,000 at Inglis Classic last year and have named The Real Man.

Real Desire had 2022 off, last year had a colt by Pierro who is a three-quarter-brother to Skybird and is now in-foal to Lightning winner Home Affairs.

Skybird's next start will be the 12th appearance for the four-year-old, who Freedman bought for $110,000 out of the Highway Session at Inglis Classic.

She won her first three starts, culminating with the Group 2 Moonee Valley Fillies Classic (1600m) before a third placing in the Group 1 Thousand Guineas (1600m).

Her only win since came in the Group 2 Tobin Bronze Stakes (1200m) and she placed in both the Bobbie Lewis Quality (1200m) and Blazer Stakes (1400m) at Group 2 level last spring before finishing midfield in the 1500m Golden Eagle.

"She was always a really, really nice foal and even as a yearling in the paddock, both sales companies loved her, they were just concerned about commercial Exosphere was going to be, which I think is why she end up in Highway Session," Evans said.

"I used to joke to people that if she was by Deep Field she would have topped the sale, that's how nice she was.

"She was always just a quality filly, very intelligent, a really strong physical and she had quality all the way through."

Skybird's preparations for her autumn campaign included a second placing in an 800m Horsham jumpout on February 5, when she swept home from second-last under a light ride, and she has drawn barrier three in the Lightning with John Allen to ride.

She has been ticking off milestones for HP Thoroughbreds with each step up the ranks and Evans has his fingers crossed that her rise has not ended.

"We don't breed a lot of horses, we only have 30 mares on the farm and there's only three of them that we own ourselves," he said.

"So, we have 25 a year and half are kept for breed-to-race clients, so we only sell 10 or 12 a year and she's definitely the flagbearer.

"She was our first Stakes winner, our first Group 2 winner, our first one Group 1-placed and may have even been the first one of ours to run in a Group 1 race.

"Hopefully she can become the first Group 1 winner."