HARRY Coffey covered some country at the weekend – from Swan Hill to Flemington and back up the road to Swan Hill again for the final day of the 2025 bet365 Swan Hill June Racing Carnival.
Friday was a winner at Swan Hill, and then on Saturday he relocated to Flemington where he swept to victory on Shockletz in the $150,000 Country Racing It’s Got It All Trophy over 2000m.
Seizing victory on the line – by a nose.
And it was an amazing ride which got him that close to the business end of the race.
At the halfway mark he was more than 10 lengths off the pace and bowling along at the tail end of the 16-horse field.
With no-one offering to tow Coffey into the race he swung wide coming out of the last bend and was still bringing up the rear as the leaders straightened for the run home. And kept coming.
But at the 100m the red-hot favourite was still almost two lengths adrift of the 60/1 bolter Prochester; with 50m to go Shockletz was flying and at the line it was a photo. Then it was a win. Unbelievable.
“Before the race I told Connections I would handle it and this would be an easy watch,” Coffey admitted post-race.
“And I don’t think it was, it took the whole straight and I think they would have been a little bit nervous.
“She’s a little ripper but she still doesn’t know what she’s doing yet, although she has a spectacular turn of foot when she rests early.
“And I think as she matures and starts to learn her craft better the owners are going to have a lot of fun.
“They went fast early, and then sort of stopped, and it became quite muddling, and I just wanted to be in clear air so I could manoeuvre my way into it.
“And as we bunched I was really confident that I would win the race because her turn of foot would get her out of trouble and then when I looked up the leader was a lot further in front than I thought.
“To my girl’s credit – albeit she was probably peaking late – she got the job done.”
