Grey's Inn
Much travelled and top class racehorse Greys Inn has his first crop of two-year-olds racing this season and was credited with his first winner when filly To Go West made all the running to win at the third attempt over 1300m at Greyville on Tuesday March 29th.
Greys Inn enjoyed a stellar career when trained by Mike de Kock for Mrs Bridget Oppenheimer. He won six races between 1200 and 2400m in a career which took him to Dubai, Hong Kong, and Australia, where he competed in the Melbourne Cup. The first six months or so of 2004 virtually belonged to Greys Inn, who won the Gr 1 SA Classic and Gr 1 SA Derby before going on to land the Gr 1 Vodacom Durban July. Not surprisingly, he was voted champion three-year-old male for that season. Subsequently exported, Greys Inn won the Gr 3 Dubai City of Gold at Nad al Sheba and then headed to Hong Kong, where he finished second in the Gr 1 QE II Cup. His international campaign earned Greys Inn a Timeform rating of 123, which was superior to a host of international Gr 1 winners of the same year.
Australian-bred Greys Inn is a son of the superb New Zealand stallion Zabeel, himself the son of another New Zealand legend in Sir Tristram. Winner of the Gr 1 Caulfield Guineas in Australia, Zabeel has been champion combined Australia/New Zealand sire no fewer than 13 times and has sired a host of champions including Octagonal, Hong Kong superstar Vengeance Of Rain, Melbourne Cup winners Might And Power, Efficient and Jezabeel, and Cox Plate winners Maldivian and Savabeel. Zabeel’s good stallion sons include Octagonal and Reset.
Greys Inn is out of the Christmas Tree mare Great Verdict, who won three races over 1400m, but it is with Greys Inn’s second dam Summoned that the fun really starts. Although she never raced, Summoned produced five times Australian Gr 1 winner and decent sire Zeditave and four other individual Gr 3 winners. Summoned is also the ancestress of New Zealand champion three-year-old filly Shikoba and of Australian Gr 2 winner Jet Spur.
Ten–year-old Greys Inn was returned to South Africa for stallion duties at the end of his racing career and stands at Graeme Koster’s Rosedene Stud near Beaufort West, where his 2010 fee was advertised as R20 000 (live foal).
