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The Australasian racing world has been saddened by the passing this week of the dual New Zealand Horse of the Year and multiple Group One winner Rough Habit.
Affectionately known as Roughie on both sides of the Tasman, he earned a cult following in Queensland where he won six times at the highest level with three Doomben Cups, two Stradbroke Handicaps and a Queensland Derby to his credit.
Rough Habit was also the Group One winner in New Zealand of the Captain Cook Stakes, in Sydney of the Queen Elizabeth Stakes and two All-Aged Stakes and in Melbourne of the Caulfield Stakes.A son of Roughcast and Certain Habit, the New Zealand Racing Hall of Famer was bred in the Hawke’s Bay by Isabel Roddick and trained by John Wheeler throughout his 74-start career.
He won 29 races from 1200-2400 metres during an illustrious career with stake earnings in excess of $4 million.Rough Habit, who was 28, enjoyed a lengthy retirement at Cambridge Thoroughbred Lodge where he was the star turn of their horse shows.
Rough Habit’s passing follows that of another outstanding galloper of the 1990s in the Turner family’s Veandercross, who was regularly in Wheeler’s care when he crossed the Tasman from his Wanganui base to meet and beat Australia’s best performers.Both great characters in their own right, they provided Wheeler with a memorable quinella in the Gr.1 Mackinnon Stakes with Veandercross’ victory coming between second placings in both the Caulfield and Melbourne Cups of 1992.
Along with his Gr.1 Cox Plate winner Poetic Price, Wheeler rated Rough Habit and Veandercross as the best horses he has trained and always championed their individual qualities, rather than rate them in any particular order.