Williams selects Australian trainers 10:15am – Racing.com

Lloyd Williams has turned to two of Victoria’s most successful trainers in recent times to prepare his Australian-based horses with confirmation that future Williams’ runners will be under the care of Danny O’Brien and Anthony Freedman.

The six-time Melbourne Cup winning owner announced last month that he is to sell Macedon Lodge and that the Irish stable of Joseph O’Brien would be his main launch-base for future Melbourne Cup attempts.

But his son Nick told RSN927’s Racing Pulse on Tuesday morning that a number of the stable’s horses are remaining in the country and need new homes.

Just last month, O’Brien joined the Melbourne Cup winner’s club when he trained Vow And Declare to victory and Freedman was part of the Freedman Brothers Incorporated when older brother Lee trained Tawrrific (1989), Subzero (1992) and Doriemus (1995) to Cup victory.

He was also a driving force behind the family’s Markdel property in Rye where Makybe Diva was trained to win her last two Melbourne Cups in 2004 and 2005.

Among their successes this year, O’Brien and Freedman took both the spring staying classics with Miami Bound winning the Kennedy Oaks for O’Brien and Warning taking the Victoria Derby for Freedman.

Williams said the facilities both trainers offered was instrumental in the decision with O’Brien’s Flemington stables complimented by his 13th Beach property at Barwon Heads with Freedman also boasting a Flemington base on top of his stables at the lavish Pinecliff training centre at Mt Eliza.

“It’s horses for courses really,” Williams said.

“Danny has obviously got that wonderful beach property at Thirteenth Beach and we think some of the staying horses will really suit that programs and will go to Anthony that will suit him.

“We sent the first lot back in work down to Anthony last week – it’s only three or four horses – but there will be more to follow and some others, including Homesman, going to Anthony next week.

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“We’re splitting them up to where we think they will suit best.

“Danny O’Brien will soon get a handful of talented stayers to train. He’s got King Of Leogrance, Venice Beach and Nelson – they are horses that we have a lot of time for – and some others will be following down there.

“We’ve still got Macedon Lodge. They are still spelling up there and doing a little bit of pre-training and once it gets time to go to a trainer, we’ll work out which trainer to send them to.

“The only thing that is really changing with our operation is that we’re not training them at Macedon Lodge ourselves and really, that’s come about for two reasons.

“I’ve got no doubt Macedon Lodge has a huge edge as a training property but we don’t have enough horses to fully utilise the property and dad’s coming up to 80 and he liked to be overseeing it all but he’s got to an age where it doesn’t really suit him very much anymore.”

Williams said the family could be buyers again on the Australian market into the future.

“We would love to exclusively be buying horses in Australia and New Zealand if the breeders were breeding horses that were suitable,” he said.

“I think it’s terrific that Danny won the Cup this year with a locally-bred horse but at this point I’d be saying the local horses, you need to be freak to be competitive over the middle distance and staying trips. You do get the odd freak, but you have to be lucky

“The tide is turning with the breeding of stayers in this country and I am hoping over the next three to five years we see something like what we used to see in New Zealand were you could go over and buy with confidence.

“You knew what you were getting and you had a fair chance of getting a good horse. You haven’t got that yet here but as soon as we do, we’ll be back buying with a vengeance.”