Our winner for September was Ian Brown and his wife Kate Dansie for their recent winners – Ian gave us these details of their successes: I have been involved in racing for over 30years and with my wife Kate own horses which are in training with John MacMillan at Clayton Bay. During the Month of September we were lucky to have four winners which included two metro wins with Creance (4yr old by Reset – Clean) who we recently purchased from Darley. Creance’s wins were on September 14th and September 27th both at Morphettville over 1200m and 1300m respectively. Boristar (5yr Old by Commands – Qillionaire) who recently came back from a broken pelvis gave us a wonderful win in the 1500m Gawler Cup on September 28th. Boristar won again after being freshened at Morphettville on October 28th over 1400m. He has now won 8 out of 20 races and is one to keep an eye out on Emirates Day in Melbourne. Casper's Ghost (Conatus – Stacked) is a 3 year old which a close friend Ross Webb and I bred. We were very excited when Casper won first up in a Metro Maiden at Morphettville on September 20th. We are also involved in On Strike (Charge Forward – Sapphire Girl who is running next Saturday (November 8th) he will be going for four in a row and we also have three 2yr old Unraced horses bred by Ross and I. We wish Ian and Kate well with their horses in the following weeks. By the time this goes to print we will know better how Boristar and On Strike performed as they faced their big challenges. Ian has of course recently joined the SAROA committee and in fact was able to boast a winner on the day of our AGM, so that was a promising start for his involvement with SAROA.

This month we received a nomination from our former president Dean Mann who wrote: I am nominating Dean & Linda Alcorn as owners of the month for January following the win of 4yo mare Rhinestone Ruby at Strathalbyn on 12th January.   Our Black Ruby, the dam of Rhinestone Ruby, was purchased by me in September 2008 at an Adelaide Magic Millions Sale and when I returned home I had an email from Dean Alcorn congratulating me on the purchase and saying that he was the under-bidder and if he had known earlier we could have formed a partnership.    I replied by saying that my intention was to race her progeny and we could have one if he wanted to. We formed a partnership and sent her to be served by Blevic, but after several months she did not get pregnant and we were told by Kambula Stud that there was no obvious reason for this, so we sent her to be served by Akhadan late in the season. The resultant foal was Rhinestone Ruby, born on 27th December, so we obviously did not mate the mare in the following season.   In mid-2010, we jointly decided to quit Our Black Ruby and entered her for an Adelaide MM sale and she injured herself on the Friday prior to it. I paid Dean & Linda a small amount to quit their share in her and I subsequently sold Our Black Ruby and her next Akhadan filly in May 2012. We both retained an interest in Rhinestone Ruby until December 2012 when, as part of my continuing dispersal of horses, Dean & Linda paid the transfer of ownership cost to have outright ownership.   Dean & Linda race Rhinestone Ruby on their own and she obviously has ability and a wonderful temperament, but she has had physical issues which have added extra costs in getting her to the races and I certainly hope this is only the first of many wins to reward their persistence and patience. I believe they would be worthy winners of the SAROA owner of the month award for January.   SAROA extends our best wishes to Dean and Linda and trusts they received continued enjoyment from racing Rhinestone Ruby.