Brilliant trotting mare Jilliby Ballerini rounded out a memorable 30 minutes for the Rochester-based Pangrazio family when she claimed her first Group 1 win in the $60,000 Aldebaran Park Sumthingaboutmaori at Melton on Saturday.
In the previous race, Heza Gun gave the 2025 Ian Daff Memorial Award winners their first success on the night when he took out the Greg Sugars Always In Our Hearts Trot.
The pair are both five-year-olds by the 10-time leading sire Majestic Son out of daughters of Sundon and were both sold at the Nutrien Equine Melbourne Yearling Sale in 2022.
Driven by Glen Craven, Jilliby Ballerini was sent to the top soon after the start and was seldom in danger of defeat, winning by 6.7 metres from her stablemate Jilliby Dreamlover.
Jilliby Ballerini, who was bred by Louise Pangrazio and her parents Malcolm and the late Joan Shaw, boasts a bankroll of $475,109.
“She’s definitely the best horse that’s come from our farm,” Neville Pangrazio said.
“The trotters Broke As Usual, Tennotrump and Brunelleschi and the pacers Mindari Priddy and Pacific Charm were among others bred off the farm, but Jilliby Ballerini has outshone them all.”
Interestingly, Jilliby Ballerini has close family ties to the horse that Saturday’s race at Melton was named after.
“She is a grand-daughter of a half-sister to Sumthingaboutmaori in Yankee Princess, who was foaled the same year that Sumthingaboutmaori won the Inter Dominion,” Neville said.
Jilliby Ballerini is the second foal of the five-win mare Shesasundon.
Her first foal, Shesawish (by Wishing Stone) won seven races including the Vicbred Platinum Home Grown 3YO Classic and The Holmfield.
“She’s since produced Majestic Lord, a full brother to Jilliby Ballerini that goes really good, a yearling colt by On A Streak which sold for $30,000 at the recent Nutrien sale and a lovely filly foal by King Of The North,” Neville said.
Blackrange Glory, a half-brother to Heza Gun, rounded out a memorable weekend for the popular northern Victorian family when he scored an effortless win at Charlton on Sunday. The pair were bred by Neville Pangrazio’s parents Michael and Fay.
Pat Driscoll’s Yabby Dam Farms bred important winners on both islands of New Zealand last Friday. The two-year-old Duke Of Bourbon won a prelude of the Young Guns at the Premier Meeting at Auckland, while the three-year-old Tetrick saluted at Addington.
Katunga Express, a runaway winner at Ballarat on Thursday, is a grandson of the 2017 Australian Broodmare of the Year Amarillen. The five-year-old was bred by Rhiannon Park’s Dean and Blanche Poole and Fred and Pauline Barker.
Muskee, the winner of the Vicbred Voucher Trot at the Bendigo midweek meeting, was bred and is raced by the John Justice stable stalwart Graeme Riley.
