WHEN it’s the Ararat Cup and more than half of your seven rides for the day – including joint favourite The Genius in the cup – have just been gutted by scratchings, you tend to want to make every post a winner.
Harry Coffey headed for the goldfields on Sunday and by the time he arrived, was down to four rides.
He would be watching the cup – which he has previously won three times – from the stands.
It made for a pretty depressing drive from Swan Hill, even for a professional used to taking the downs with the ups.
So in classic Coffey style, he grabbed what little of the day he had left by the scruff of the neck and shook out a winning double.
Which surely made the return journey home a little more enjoyable.
It all started in the $37,500 Midland Irrigation Plate over 1600m with the well supported Patrick and Michelle Payne-trained Verona Rupes breaking its maiden at its third start.
Jumping well from the gates Coffey quickly had the three-year-old gelding up on the pace in what turned out to be a slowly run mile until the 400m mark, when he asked the question.
Challenge made, his horse swept to the lead and as the field straightened for home he took charge.
By the 200m mark Coffey and Co were a length clear with 30/1 bolter Scorpion Bay emerging late – half a length late as they hit the line.
“Ararat Cup day has been very good to me over the years; so it is nice to get a winner early on, and this horse looked pretty ready to go,” Coffey said.
“He was third up and back over the mile and fit now, and that’s how I rode him, although we were going up the straight by ourselves and he was waiting for another horse, but we got the job done and we even had some owners here today who also bred the horse.
“The track has been pretty dry, I have certainly seen it with a bit more moisture in it, so it was playing fast and with the small fields on hard and fast track it created challenges when making up ground.”
Things were far more dramatic two races later in the $35,000 AME Systems Handicap, also over 1600m.
There Coffey rode the heavily backed two-start four-year-old gelding Dramaticus to victory – by a nose.
Ciaron Maher’s even-money favourite King’s Valley did everything it could to bridge the gap.
At the 200m it appeared the favourite had Coffey cold but the Swan Hill hoop all but picked Dramaticus up and threw him at the finish line.
Coffey thought the win exceptionally good as the horse has been proving a handful for everyone involved.
“He’s a bit hot, and a bit of a worrier, but I think with time and experiences at the racecourse that will sort of iron out,” Coffey said.
“And he was relatively good today, so Sam and the team said to just go calmly on him and give him a good experience, as he does put a lot of effort into worrying.
“But as I said, he was pretty good today and we had a nice run and then had to manoeuvre our way into the clear and I still thought we were beaten by Ciaron’s horse with Linda (Meech) on.
“To his credit he kept finding enough and I think he will be even better suited over a bit more ground, he’s a big one-paced horse and feels like he could keep coming all day.”
In other local racing news Nathan Hobson took a big team to the Broken Hill Cup meeting on Saturday and saw Rocket Boy cash in on recent good form with a massive 11.5-length win in the $12,000 Southern Cross Austereo Handicap over 1600m.
It was the five-year-old gelding’s first win since June last year.
