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Tara Madgwick - Monday, 7 November 2011
Anyone with any involvement in horses is well aware that for every high, there is invariably a low.
Ray Willis' Southern Highlands based Rheinwood Pastoral Co capped off a big week at the track on Saturday with top class galloper Albert The Fat (Magic Albert) winning the Group I VRC Emirates Stakes at Flemington and Havatryst (Foreplay) winning the BRC Simon George & Sons Plate at Doomben.
 This followed a double on Melbourne Cup Day at Randwick with Unchain My Heart (Al Maher) winning the ATC Flinders Lane Perfect Fit Shirt and Dark Brown Sugar (Pendragon) winning the ATC Bacardi Maiden Plate.
All horses were bred or raised at Rheinwood Pastoral Co in Mittagong, NSW.
"Results on the track are what yearling buyers are interested in,” said Ray Willis.
"You can have well presented yearlings that look the part, but at the end of the day they need to run and prove that you know what you are doing.”
Sold under the Rheinwood banner at the 2006 Magic Millions Yearling Sale for $40,000, Albert the Fat (pictured Taron Clarke Photography) was bred by NSW based breeder John Allen, who keeps a number of mares at Rheinwood.
"I was watching the Emirates on Saturday and was torn between cheering for Albert the Fat and Secret Admirer, who is owned by one of my best mates in John Muir,” said Willis.
"Albert the Fat has been a great horse for his owners winning over $1.2 million and it's a terrific result for John Allen, who bred the horse as he has two half-sisters to his dam Alemar that have both produced foals by Magic Albert this spring.”
 The thrill of Group I success however, has been tempered by tragedy for the family following the recent loss of Albert the Fat's dam Alemar.
"She foaled a colt to Testa Rossa, but then became ill a few days later and despite being rushed to the university, she died on the way and not long after so did the colt,” Willis revealed.
Alemar's last foal (pictured here at Rheinwood last spring), now a yearling colt by Magic Albert, is part of a six horse draft for Rheinwood Pastoral Co that will head to the Gold Coast in January for the 2012 Magic Millions Yearling Sale.
"We've sold full brothers to Albert the Fat at the Gold Coast in the past two years to Anthony Cummings ($100,000) and Jamie Walter ($95,000) and I think this colt might be better again,” said Willis.
"He is the spitting image of Albert the Fat.”
Aside from Albert the Fat's brother, Rheinwood will present three yearlings by boom first season sire Northern Meteor (pictured below) , as well as a colt by Tale of the Cat (USA) and a filly by Fastnet Rock.
 "The Northern Meteors are very precocious types and he's a young sire that I really believe will make the grade,” Willis said.
"We've got a filly by him from Comedy Club that is an absolute movie star!”
The Tale of the Cat (USA) colt is a half-brother to smart stakes-winner So Anyway that was sold by Rheinwood at the Magic Millions in 2008 to Patinack Farm for $200,000, while the Fastnet Rock filly is from well related mare Longueville Lass, a member of the Denise's Joy family.
"She's a lovely filly and very closely related to Group III winner Stryker,” Willis said.
"His fillies are certainly flying at the moment and she's a very typical Fastnet.”
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