Redoute’s Choice globetrotter Musir made a successful hit-and-run raid to Istanbul on Sunday. The Mike De Kock trained stallion was an easy winner of the valuable G2 Topkapi Trophy which was worth AUD 612,000.
Musir (5h Redoute’s Choice – Dizzy De Lago by Encosta De Lago) was always travelling well within himself and the outcome was never in doubt once he hit the front in the straight.
“It’s my first time here,” De Kock said. “Good racetrack, great city and Istanbul has been very good to us. Musir will have some time off and then, perhaps, we will go back for the Dubai Carnival.”
Musir was offered for sale at the 2008 Inglis Easter yearling sale but was passed in for $900,000. Sheikh Mohammed bin Khalifa bred the colt and made the decision to export him to South Africa where he posted a Group 1 victory in the 2009 Golden Horseshoe.
De Kock set him for the 2010 Dubai carnival and he was a class above the opposition in the G3 UAE 2000 Guineas and G2 UAE Derby.
Sent to Australia for a 2010 Cox Plate campaign, he didn’t settle in so De Kock took him back to the Gulf where he disappointed in this year’s G1 Dubai World Cup.
The next port of call was Hong Kong in April and he finished third, beaten a half-length by Xtension, in the G1 BMW Champions Mile at Sha Tin.
Returning to De Kock’s Newmarket base in England, he was placed in the G2 Hungerford Stakes at Newbury last month prior to his latest away trip to Turkey.
Arrowfield champion Redoute’s Choice has sired 76 stakes winners world-wide. His other off-shore black-type winners include Elzaam & Tazahum (GB), Clianthus (Japan), King’s Rose & Redoute’s Dancer (NZ) and Bishops Rock (South Africa).