Brendon McCullum wins big at the Boxing Day races with Defibrillate

Brendon McCullum with Auckland Thoroughbred Racing chief Paul Wilcox. Photo / Trish Dunell

Brendon McCullum can’t stop winning, even though there wasn’t a cricket ball in sight at the Pukekohe races today.

The New Zealand cricketer and now coach of the resurgent English test team only returned home from winning the series against Pakistan last week and found himself in the Group 1 winner’s circle as a part-owner of Defibrillate in the $320,000 Zabeel Classic.

The feature event is usually held at Ellerslie but the Boxing Day meeting was moved to Pukekohe this season as the Auckland track undergoes a track renovation.

And it was Defibrillate, the veteran galloper McCullum owns with among others former champion jockey Lance O’Sullivan, who took out the weight-for-age race of the day, staving off the challenge of favourite Prise De Fer after the latter looked set to run him down at the 100m mark.

“It is great to be home,” said McCullum from the winner’s circle bar.

“I am loving my time up there [England] and they are a great bunch of guys, which is what it is all about.

“But it is still very special to come back here and then to win a race like this a few days after getting home is amazing.”

McCullum has been a long-time racing fan, owner and breeder and once had a huge stable of horses.

He has trimmed his numbers but still retains an interest in 14 horses, almost all of them with Defibrillate’s trainer and co-owner Graham Richardson.

Brendon McCullum, right, with his wife Ellissa, in the Group 1 winner’s circle at Pukekohe. Photo / Trish Dunell

“Breeding can be tough and being based in England and with the travel in the job I get more enjoyment out of racing them rather than the longer game of breeding,” he said.

“But as much as I love racing I haven’t been to the races much in England, it tends to be mainly cricket or cricket-related activities up there.”

Defibrillate has spent most of his racing career in Australia, only returning home three starts ago.

“He was just at the end of his tether over there but we hoped he could be a Group 1 horse here still and so it has proved,” said Richardson, who trains in partnership with Rogan Norvall.

“He has always been a very good horse but the key to him still being competitive at this level is he hasn’t had too many starts.

Defibrillate, ridden by Warren Kennedy, winning the Group 1 Cambridge Stud Zabeel Classic (2000m) in the Boxing Day Races at Pukekohe Park. Photo / Kristin Ledington

“He is an 8-year-old but today was only his 30th start and I am sure he can come back next season and race at this level again.”

Richardson won his second Zabeel Classic in a row after Tiptronic last year. He has recently been retired and when Defibrillate eventually finishes his career the two old gentlemen of the stable will live their days out side by side.

“Eventually this fella [Defibrillate] will retire to the paddock next to Tiptronic.”

Richardson will now try and pull off a different training success as he sets Defibrillate for the $450,000 Herbie Dyke Stakes at Te Rapa on February 11, for which he is now the $4 equal favourite.

“I think he goes his best races fresh so we will go straight into that, maybe with a trial,” says Richardson, who also trained Tiptronic to win the Herbie Dyke in 2021, so has an imposing recent record in NZ’s few middle distance weight-for-age Group 1s.

Defibrillate’s win made it back-to-back feature wins for South African import jockey Warren Kennedy and he added the last race on Uderzo to complete a late treble.

“To end 2022 with a Group 1 here is incredibly satisfying,” says Kennedy. “I have had great support since we got here and am riding some lovely horses so I am looking forward to what lies ahead next year.”