IT takes a team to win a horse race, and for Swan Hill trainer Helen Burns it also needed a jockey – and the jockey’s manager – to get the job done at Mildura on Saturday.
Fellow local trainer Nathan Hobson used a different approach for his win – he stacked the last race of the day with four runners and then “sounded the charge”.
The only thing the two trainers had in common was they also got two horses in the first three – Burns picked up a third in her race and Hobson landed the quinella in his.
“The funny thing is I had the favourite in the race – The Last Judgement – and I thought he was my best shot of the three I had taken to Mildura,” Burns said.
“And in the run to the line I thought he was going to get up.
“But Neil Farley’s manager, Rachael Allen, had been talking to me about a ride for him on Judgement.
“I told her he needed the 4kg claim so I got with Chris Pang on board.
“So she pushed me to go for the 100m race and put Neil on Superior Force, which I did.”
It was an inspired agreement.
As everyone’s attention was on the duel between The Last Judgement and O’whatapicture, Farley kicked his mount into gear and exploded down the very outside of the track to grab the win in the last stride.
“We have had trouble with him,” Burns said.
“He has twice been scratched in the barrier for putting his legs up on the rails so this time we used a barrier blanket for the first time and it seemed to do the trick.
“We’ll keep using it now, I think.”
Burns said the win was also a huge day out for part owner Merida Morrish.
She not only towed one of Burns’ floats to the track, she led the horse before the race – and then got to celebrate the victory.
“That’s what you call a hands-on owner,” Burns laughed.
“That shows why you need the support of a lot of people to get a horse to a race and I am lucky to have that.”
Hobson took 10 horses downriver to the meeting and finished off with his last-race quinella to make it a good day out.
He said it might have been a long wait for the win but it was worth it.
Even better, the horse paid a respectable $7.90 for its supporters.
Hobson’s four runners in the $27,000 Mildura Motor Holdings Handicap over 1400m split into pairs, almost by design, soon after the field jumped, with Don’t Tell Sheriff and King and King doing all the hard work out front.
“I actually thought the second-placed one might have got up and it was close in the end – just half a length,” Hobson said.
“We’ll be heading for Donald this weekend, with a team of 10 I think – including today’s winner.
“I would also like to thank my team for all their hard work, which helps me enormously and which makes it so much easier to get the horses ready for race day.
“And that’s what they will be doing again all this week as we get the horses ready for Donald – I couldn’t do it without them.”
