WHEN they jumped in the $27,000 Bart Stiles Bookmaker Handicap (1600m) at Warracknabeal on Saturday, the race caller left no one in doubt. He ran through the field and finished with “and Sanctimonious is last”.
At the 800m mark he hadn’t changed his mind: “with Sanctimonious still bringing up the rear”.
It started to get repetitious, but at the 600m and 400m, Sanctimonious was still good for that passing reference, because he was still stone cold last.
As the field turned for home, apprentice Ryan Houston looked so far out of the race that instead of heading straight down the straight, he appeared to be heading straight for the car park and an early ride home to avoid further embarrassment.
Even Helen Burns, the Swan Hill-based trainer of the seven-year-old gelding, figured her day was not only over, it had not even begun.
But not only was something about to change, the race caller just about missed it – until the last few metres. Probably because he was still looking for Sanctimonious at the back of the field.
Houston, however, had a plan in all his poor positioning and going so very wide on the turn.
A quite simple plan, really.
Point Sanctimonious down the straight towards the finish line and flick the afterburner switch.
Incredibly, Sanctimonious almost didn’t make it to the track for what was about to become a spectacular success because Burns had been so disappointed with his previous run there, a dismal seventh.
“I was looking for somewhere with a bigger track, bigger straight where I thought he would go better, but in the end, he did much better today,” Burns said.
“Connie (strapper Connie McFarlane) and I were standing there watching, and when we saw him come wide, we didn’t think he had it.
“Then he was absolutely flying and from where we were I still wasn’t sure – it wasn’t until Connie showed me the finish on her phone a bit later that I realised how much he had won by.”
And it wasn’t just Burns having a ball with the win – the horse’s Newcastle owners had decided to use a slice of their prizemoney to treat themselves to dinner that night.
There was no news how they pulled up the next morning, but Burns said Sanctimonious was in fine fettle immediately after the win and she had already set his next run.
“It will be a 0-58BM over the mile at the Swan Hill Cup Carnival on our hometown track and he should be fine for that, he stayed up a long time in his previous prep and he’s only had six starts this time round, so I would expect him to go deep into the winter.”
Burns was also full of praise for the team on which she relied so heavily to maintain her stables.
“Connie was such a help today as I had to drive the truck with my horse and three of (fellow Swan Hill trainer) Nathan Hobson’s as he had gone to Flemington to watch his last-start winner Yulong Storm in the $80,000 Stableline Sprint (where he finished third),” Burns said.
“But there’s also the people who help me at home, trackworkers, family and friends who turn up in the early morning and in the afternoon and without their support I would not be able to do the work I have been – I owe them so much.”
So long as they don’t expect much from Burns’ winnings on Sanctimonious. She remembered to put a whopping $2 on the nose on the Friday (“with my horse and Nathan’s three, I would have been too busy Saturday and forgotten”).
He paid $20.40. Times two. $40.80. Didn’t even cover the petrol money. Maybe next time.
