Our nomination for Owner of the month for August is Wayne and Jenny Francis for their winners – Rocket Commander, Zipnotised and Cyclone Thomas. All three horses are trained by Wayne in partnership with Glen Kent (well known horse-breaker and accomplished rodeo rider). The partnership has been had a strong run of success in the last few months from their Finniss Lodge base.

Of the three horses perhaps the most promising is Rocket Commander now a 4 year old (Court Command – Pinot Royale by Red Ransom). She has won 2 races and run second 4 times in her last six starts. Her full race record is 20 starts for 5 wins, 4 seconds and 4 thirds and prizemoney of a bit over $120,000. Her most recent effort was a very close second to Okahu Bay in the Gawler Cup, this followed a second at Morphettville and two wins (1 in August) on the Parks track, both over 1400m. The stable told us she was “a tough horse, not overly large but very game and has a big heart. Wasn’t expensive & we wish we had more like her in the stable”.

Zipnotised is a six year old mare (Clangalang – Zipnotic by Monolith), she is a home bred, whose grand dam Eastern Charm left two stakes winners for the Francis family Goodwood winner Zip Zip Aray and Zipanese. Her recent record is quite solid having started 10 times this preparation for 2 wins, 2 seconds and a third. Her full record is 31 starts for 3 wins, 4 seconds and 6 thirds and stakes of $48020. Her win in August was over 1509m at Gawler.

Cyclone Thomas started his career with David Jolly and has more recently transferred to the Francis Kent Stable – he is part owned by SAROA life member Fred Vella. He is a 5 year old gelding (Dylan Thomas – Concluding by Kenny’s Best Pal) and has won only the once over 1550m in a maiden at Morphettville Park. His record reads 12 starts for 1 win, 3 seconds and a third. He is well related being a half-brother to the four times stakes winner Moment in Time who was raced by other SAROA members in June and Bryan Terry and won almost $600,000 before being retired to stud.

Wayne and Jenny have a number of other promising horses in the stable and we wish them all the best for the future and thank them for their continued sponsorship of SAROA.