Pencarrow Racing ended 2013 in style with North of Sunset (NZ) (Red Ransom) winning the last race of the year in New Zealand with victory in the Rating 65 $9,000 J Sawp Stock Food 1600m at Stratford on New Year’s Eve.

The daughter of Red Ransom was having her second start back from a spell having finished sixth in a fresh state at Ellerslie when held up in the final straight for trainers Steven Ramsay and Julia Ritchie.

Samantha Collet travelled down to Stratford for the ride and positioned the four-year-old mare outside the leader from barrier 5. The pair were left in front early in the straight as the leader dropped away quickly and Collet nursed the mare for as long as she could.

With a challenge coming from her outside Collet got to work on North of Sunset and the mare responded as she repelled the efforts of Get Flash (Soviet Flash) to record victory by half-a-length at the line.

“Her run at Ellerslie was pretty good, she didn’t get all favours in the race,” said Ramsay. “Sam (Collet) rode her positively and sat outside the leader so it was a good tough win, she kicked away nicely.

“She grinded away pretty good and that was second up. She ran a good fourth in the Group 3 Lowland Stakes after a hard run so it will be nice to get up to a trip.

“I think she wants to get over a trip as well, she probably wants a mile-and-a-quarter. We are just going to go through the grades with her and see how it pans out.

It was the second win from 11 starts for North of Sunset who has earned $20,975 in prizemoney for her owner Sir Peter Vela who bred the mare in conjunction with Philip Vela.

North of Sunset is by Red Ransom and is out of the winning Zabeel mare Zygadene, a sister to dual Group 2 winner Lafluer (Zabeel). North of Sunset is the first foal of Zygadene and is from the famous Eight Carat family with her third dam being triple Group 1 winner in Europe Habibti (Habitat).

Zygadene has colt at foot by champion New Zealand sire O’Reilly and was served by Pentire in the 2013 breeding season.

Pencarrow Racing nearly made it a double with Chevremont (NZ) (No Excuse Needed) finishing second earlier in the day at Stratford.