‘Ciaron Maher took her home, but he couldn’t sell her’: Nobody wanted this ‘goddess’, now she chases Group 1 glory

There is nothing really pretty about Proxima Dea, her trainer David Payne will tell you, but she is unbeaten in four starts going into Saturday’s Spring Champion Stakes at Randwick.

So she is perfect in the most important way.

Looks are why she proved a hard sell twice, even being a sister of Queensland Oaks winner Gypsy Goddess, and the reason found her way back to breeders Hugh Docherty and Andy Giles.

“We are lucky to have her, but as my wife Kathleen keeps telling me, she is perfect for us,” Docherty said.

The journey started before Gypsy Goddess came onto the racing scene in 2021. Giles and Docherty, who loved a staying filly and had owned four-time Group 1 winner Montefilia, bought her mum Invincible Coin for just $7000 online to breed another stayer.

“She had a foal at foot and one in her belly,” Docherty recalled. “But then Gypsy Goddess came along, and we had to send her back to Tarzino.

“We sent this filly to the sale, and there wasn’t a bid for her, but Ciaron Maher [signed for the $300,000 reserve] took her home, but he couldn’t sell her.

“I rang them a couple of months later and asked how it was going, and they said slowly. I spoke to someone in the stable who said they like her, so we took her back to race.

“Once that happened she was always going to David [Payne], he’s our trainer.”

Giles named her, Proxima Dea, which translates from latin to be another goddess.

Like their star Montefilia, this Goddess would be a $51 winner on debut as a late two-year-old, but as she stepped out in trip she has just got better.

She won again and again and her latest outing in the Gloaming Stakes was an indicator to where she is going according to her trainer.

“She has a good motor and is going to love the extra trip,” Payne told Betsy.  “It doesn’t matter what she looks like. She is only going to get better the further they go, she will get two miles.

“I have been waiting for her to 2000m and this race.”

As Proxima Dea raced through the grades it piqued interest in the jockey ranks but after her second win, Docherty had an interaction with Zac Lloyd.

And again things fell into place.

“Zac had ridden State Of America to five wins for us and he said to me in the mounting yard, gee ‘she’s a nice filly’. I told him we were going to the Spring Champion and Oaks that he should try to get the ride,” Docherty said.

“There were four jockeys in the mix, but we know Zac and had luck with him and wanted to go with him.

“We have a very good young horse with the best young jockey.

“He is so confident about what she is going do after the Gloaming. He just said to us, the best is yet to come.

“After getting a horse like Montefilia you don’t think this could happen again, but we are hopeful we might have another Group 1 horse now.

“She still has to do it, but David and Zac fill us with confidence.”