Bel Esprit is now well and truly settled into his new paddock at Eliza Park International Queensland and the champ produced 12 winners in just the first five days of the month, including 7 winners on Saturday.

Kicking off the run last Wednesday, was John Salanitri’s To Be Honest who has now clocked up 9 wins (and 7 placings) following his second victory on the trot at Ballarat.

Bel Esprit had no runners on Thursday, but was well and truly back in action on Friday with a treble courtesy of Steve Cummins’ Superb (win #3), the Bill Hayes trained Tropical Spirit (3 from her last 4) and Gareth Andrews’ Cranbourne sprinter, Spirit or Lager who also now has 3 from his last 4.

But what about Saturday … they just kept coming. Glenthorn Avenue won his 8th for owner/trainer Lindsay Anderson; the 7YO mare, Gaelstorm lobbed with her 14th score (not to mention a further 20 placings) for a very happy Gilbert Baker; John Symons & Sheila Laxon – who know a thing to three about the Bel Esprits – saw Simply Ming log win number 5; Bel Sir (out of Neil Dyer’s great mare, Mrs Bently) has now won 2 from 2 this time in (8 wins overall); while Neil Dyer is also the trainer of another 5-time winner in Royal Request.

Special mention too for three other Bel Esprit runners on Saturday: Mick Price’s Pilly’s Wish goes from strength to strength and flew home to win at Caulfield under Dwayne Dunn. Pilly’s Wish – with 3 city wins overall – now has 2 wins and 2 seconds from her last 4 outings.

And there was a lot to like about the effort of David Pfieffer’s 2YO, Cheeky Babe, who was having her first start over the 900m at Newcastle. She certainly didn’t disappoint and clearly this close relation to Black Caviar has a big future ahead of her.

And while we can’t count her as a winner (well, not on the scoreboard anyway), Angels Beach added to her already impressive resume with a solid second behind Miss Promiscuity in the G3 Sir John Monash at Caulfield. Guess we can’t begrudge the winner as she is by Magnus!

Breednet, which collates the winners by each of the stallions throughout Australia, shows that Bel Esprit is both the nation’s leading sire by winners over the past 7 days and the last 30 days (31) but you can add one more to the list with Chevalier Star leading all the way at Sha Tin to score his second win on the trot for John Moore.

There’s nothing like a flood of winners less than 2 months out from the breeding season!