MARTINO ON A WINNING RUN
- John Curtis
- 2 hours ago
- 2 min read
With four winners from his last six starters, there’s no surprise that Fabio Martino is having his best season in his brief career to date.
The young Hawkesbury trainer, who launched his career four years ago, returned to the scene of his maiden success when bargain buy Olivia Mia at Canberra last Friday gave him his 10th winner this current racing season.
Ridden by the State’s premiership front-runner Pierre Boudvillain, Olivia Mia ($4) trounced her rivals in the Maiden Plate (1280m) on the synthetic track, at only her fourth start.
The three-year-old daughter of Cool Aza Beel (his sire Savabeel died recently) bolted home by more than four lengths from Magnamous ($26) and Skibidi ($10).
Martino’s winning run began also at Canberra’s ACTON (synthetic) track with Acquaro on June 12, then Full Of Fun (Newcastle, June 13) and All Star (Kembla Grange, June 20) provided him with further success at consecutive Saturday provincial meetings.
Martino’s first winner was Eliseo at Canberra’s course proper on November 25, 2022, and he has steadily built his team to the extent that he now has 24 horses in work at Hawkesbury.
“Things are going well,” he said today.
“I’ll be doing my best to finish the season with a flourish.
“I have three horses nominated for my home track meeting on Thursday, but I’ll see how the weather turns out in the next couple of days before making a decision about starts.”
Martino paid only $4000 for Olivia Mia at the 2024 Inglis HTBA yearling sale in Sydney – and he has Hunter Valley studmaster Peter Burke to thank for getting her.
“Peter is a good friend of mine, and bred Olivia Mia at his Taghadoe Stud at Scone,” he explained.
“He took me aside at the sale, and said he didn’t think this filly would bring much money and wanted her to go to me.
“I trialled her once as a two-year-old in April last year, but didn’t race her.
“She needed time, and even now she is still not the finished product.
“Olivia Mia had run third to Acquaro at the ACTON track a fortnight earlier, had taken nice improvement from that, and I expected her to go well.
“Pierre (Boudvillain) settled the filly behind the two leaders last Friday, and she put them away easily when clear in the straight.
“I think she will handle further as, apart from being by a son of Savabeel, her dam (Hamama) is an O’Reilly mare.”
Martino’s victory gave the Hawkesbury training base its 160th winner of the season.
