HARRY Coffey, by his own admission, is no great planner of the immediate, and not-too-distant, future.
He doesn’t, he says, set out to ride a 100-winner season.
Rather, he takes each day as it comes and gives it his best shot.
After racking up 102 winners last season – his first time in triple figures – he attacked the 2022-23 season without missing a beat, consistently booting home winner after winner.
Until a self-imposed slowdown, and then some time off around the birth of his and wife Tayla’s first child – Thomas – on May 1.
The star Swan Hill rider then eased himself back onto the track, trying to stay as close to home as possible.
But as his return rapidly started building some momentum, his renewed drive towards consecutive 100-plus seasons started to gain some traction.
And he started winning doubles, and trebles, instead of one-offs each meeting, as he was wont to do for much of 2021-22.
He did it again at Ballarat on Friday, before heading back to Caulfield on Saturday to add the $150,000 City Index Handicap (2000m) to his equally hot run of city form in the past few months.
With 88 winners in the bag and with 35 days of racing in front of him, he needs just 12 winners – that’s one every three days, although more doubles and trebles would make life much easier for that “double ton”.
Certainly something to tell young Thomas about when he’s a bit older.
At Ballarat Coffey took out the $37,500 Porter Plant Handicap (2100m) on Look Sharpish, with Nyah West’s Madison Lloyd in third on Savoie.
That was backed that up three races later with Rose Tycoon holding off Lloyd, who this time finished a close second on Cover Star.
But his Caulfield win on Normandy Bridge was the cream on the weekend’s rides.
At Sandown on May 27 he gave the beautifully bred French galloper its first win in three years before being replaced by Blake Shinn for the five-year-old gelding’s next outing at the same track on June 10.
On Saturday, he was back in the saddle and turned it on again for the Maher/Eustace stable.
“He ran really well last start, but just got beaten by a horse which snuck up on his inside with a weight advantage,” Coffey said.
“Today it looked a really nice race for him on weights and ratings and all that, and we just needed to get a good run.
“And that’s what we did, but I must admit I thought we were going to get worried out of it late when Blake shot up our inside, and sort of got a little bit in front of me too.
“But we just had enough up our sleeve to get the job done (and reverse the situation when Shinn had his shot).”
Coffey also said Normandy Bridge raced on the day as though he was ready to go a bit further, after what he said had been “a real work in progress” to get him relaxed and into good rhythms.
“It’s all coming together now, and the team has done a really good job to achieve that,” Coffey said.
“You would be right in saying once he gets to the front, he does tend to have a little think about it.
“But at the same time, we are racing against good off-season horses and these open class races are always hard to win – and I do believe he always has that little bit extra in hand, it’s just about getting it right with him to find that.
“Look, as I say, he is a work in progress and you don’t say that about these older horses very often, but I do think he’s going to be a lot better when he uses his brain a little bit better.”
