The top three breeders in Victoria last season and who are all nominees for the Woodlands Stud Victorian Breeder of the Year Award – Pat Driscoll, Anne and Bill Anderson and Bruce and Vicki Edward – produced Vicbred winners of $5,434,873 between them.

Horses bred off Driscoll’s Yabby Dam Farms totted up 146 wins and $2,150,894 in stakes, according to Harness Breeders Victoria’s April bulletin.

The biggest contributors to Yabby Dam Farms’ tally were the Inter Dominion champion and Bill Collins Sprint winner Just Believe ($278,930), the Vicbred and Breeders Crown champion The Locomotive ($198,298), the Trotters Derby winner Cravache Dor ($178,850), Im Ready Jet ($153,600) and the Vicbred champions Revelstoke ($89,820) and Visionary ($80,190).

Anne and Bill Anderson’s Lauriston Bloodstock produced Vicbred winners of 75 races and $1,892,413 at an average of $55,659 per starter. Their best performers were the top racemare Ladies In Red ($327,020), the thrice Group 1 winning filly Just Hope ($261,467), A. G. Hunter Cup hero Honolua Bay ($199,340), Ripp ($184,987), the Breeders Crown champion School Captain ($180,400), Somethin Bout Eily ($105,140) and First Responder ($93,649).

The Edwards, who conduct Durham Park Standardbreds, had Vicbred winners of 96 races and $1,391,566 including the Breeders Crown champion Act Now ($226,650), Turn It Up ($141,308) and the Group winners Beyond Delight ($190,739) and Narutac Prince.

Next on the list were Benstud Standardbreds ($1,098,053), Alabar Bloodstock (1,020,587), Harvey and Shelley Kaplan ($733,006), Robert Watson ($737,713), Aldebaran Park ($680,247), the NSW based Brooklyn Lodge ($650,531) and Peter Gleeson ($641,555).

Of the smaller Victorian breeders (four to 10 starters), Tony and Pam Coniglio produced the winners of $253,240, Noel Watson ($251,177), Pauline and the late Richard Matthews ($247,550), David Scott ($223,369), Brian and Marilyn Gourley ($205,428) and John Wilkinson ($200,385).

The 2023 Victorian Breeder of the Year Award will be presented as part of Harness Racing Victoria's Horse of the Year program at Crown Palladium on Sunday, April 30.

Dougs Babe, winner of last year’s Vicbred 4YO Final, is one of three Anzac mares to qualify for the $328,000 final of the Blue Chip Matchmaker Series at Yonkers Raceway, New York on Monday, April 24.

The others are millionairess Amazing Dream NZ and Lucky Artist. The trio were the highest point-scorers in the five-leg series.

Mesmerizing, the former top racemare owned by the Caldow family, produced winners on consecutive nights in the brothers Musztang (Melton) and Messerati (Cranbourne).

All told, Mesmerizing is the dam of seven individual winners from eight foals of racing age headed up by the dual Vicbred champion and country cups king Messini ($711,711).

A feature of the Australian sires’ statistics to date this season is the rise to the top of the two and three-year-old sections by Sweet Lou, who is already fully booked next season.

Sweet Lou’s Woodlands studmate Bettor’s Delight is again the leading All Age sire, being $1.5million ahead of the second sire Art Major.

Copy That, who was bred and raised by Woodlands Stud, boosted his earnings to almost $2 million following his win in the $1million The Race By Grins at Cambridge Raceway.

Ararat breeder Lyndon Turner landed a double at Charlton recently with a pair of Sunshine Beach sired four-year-olds in Cocora and Eyethink.

Eyethink has won five of his 12 starts, while Cocora has notched four wins.

Picture: Anne and Bill Anderson

The opinions expressed in The Forum are those of the author and may not be attributed to or represent policies of Harness Racing Victoria, which is the state authority and owner of thetrots.com.au.