About us
Suncrest Arabians really began in 1998 with the purchase of the outstanding colt Salam Mezzlah as a five-year old from his breeders, the Hardcastle family, of Salam Arabian stud.
Virginia wanted him primarily for endurance competition, where he has proven himself superbly, but she was enticed into breeding with him after he had proven himself in both performance and a wonderful temperament.
Our aim at Suncrest Arabians is to produce beautiful, quality performance Arabians with great temperaments, soundness, speed and stamina. We are delighted with Mezzlah’s stock so far – many can be viewed on our Gallery pages.
Virginia with Andy as a 5-year old after completing the 1998 Shahzada 120km trainer over three days, at an overall speed of 10 kph, with an average heartrate of 28 bpm.
The stud was founded by its present owner, Virginia Blain, with the help initially of Lalla Reeves, who later watched over the youngstock at the 60-acre breeding farm at Newbridge (acquired in 2000) for several years before handing over her responsible role to Joanne Bratby.
Jo has had training in horse management, is the proud owner of the lovely purebred mare Suncrest Sasha, and has lived on the Newbridge farm with her husband Craig and two young children, Matilda and Lawson, since April 2007. She is currently learning rapidly about the breeding side of horse management!
The whole family looked on with fascination and wonder of the birth of the first of our 2007-8 foals, Suncrest Salaam, to our foundation broodmare Silver Essence, early one misty summer morning and we were all equally thrilled to see the lovely strong filly take her first steps and have a drink from mum. Her elder full sister, Suncrest Silver Echo (b.2001, grey, 15.3hh), is now competing very successfully in endurance.
Virginia lives at the original home of Suncrest, which is a 5-acre property in Sun Valley near Springwood in the lower Blue Mountains west of Sydney. Although she travels regularly to the farm at Newbridge (between Bathurst and Blayney), it is here that she trains her endurance horses along the nearby forest trails, and stands Mezzlah at stud.
She began endurance competition in 1997, having taken up riding again after a very long gap (for professional career, marriage and children) since her early days as a showjumper and eventer in Tasmania.
he first horse she purchased for endurance was the 6-year old grey mare Naqawah (Raheem by Nilgaram Farina). Naqawah (or Nicky) has proved an excellent broodmare since retiring from endurance. She was a very successful competitor, twice winning the coveted title of top National Points Heavyweight Horse of the year (1999, 2000), which meant she won more heavyweight placings in endurance events than any other horse in Australia for those years.
In addition, she completed nearly 5000 kms in endurance, never vetted out of a marathon ride, completing a number of 160km rides, three 400km Shahzadas (two as first heavyweight), a 320 km Faraway marathon (third heavyweight), and earning a Quilty buckle with ease at the age of 16! She is the dam of Suncrest Naomi and Suncrest Noble Aenzac, and at 22 years young and completely sound, is still ridden lightly and thoroughly enjoys her outings!