Reinsman Mitch Ford is right to drive Wheres The Gold, one of the favourites for Saturday night’s $75 000 Ladbrokes Easter Cup in Launceston.
Mitch was one of five drivers involved in a nasty fall in Hobart on Friday night, resulting in his cousin and fellow driver Tiarna Ford, and clerk of the course Zane Medhurst being transported to the Royal Hobart Hospital.
At the time of writing, the pair remain in hospital and are still awaiting the results of x-rays and scans.
Miraculously, other drivers, Rodney Ashwood, Jacob Duggan and Troy Madden, and all horses, walked away from the incident.
Mitch drove the Emma Stewart-trained Wheres The Gold to win last week’s heat of the Easter Cup, coming off a 20m handicap and raced outside the leader for the final 1700m to win in track record time of 1m 57.9s.
The previous record, 1m 58.5s only stood for seven days when set by stablemate Like A Wildfire in the first heat, who will be driven in the Group 3 final by Allan McDonough, who has done well with a two-week break to the final.
“Emma has been really happy with him, he is fresh and ready to go,” said McDonough about last year’s runner-up.
“It’s an even field on Saturday. I think Emma’s two are the best horses in the race, but the traffic in front of them is going to be the trouble,” he said.
Emma Stewart-trained Tasmanian-bred pacer Longfellow to win last years race, with 10 of the 11 Easter Cup winners prior being Tasmanian trained.
Easter Cup market: $2.25 Like A Wildfire, $2.50 Wheres The Gold, $13 Rackemup Tigerpie, $14 Harjeet, $19 Cool Water Paddy $26+ others.
Allen Williams Final
The McDonough-Stewart combination has plenty of strong chances across the night, but McDonough also has one of his own horses engaged at the meeting, Dream Maze, in the Allen Williams Memorial Maiden Final.
The mare will only have four other rivals, with the race having more scratchings than final acceptors.
Dream Maze, a five-year-old mare, won her heat on debut by 33.3m in 1m 58.7s.
“She has been really good this week.
“She broke her back pastern as a two-year-old and then came back and bowed a tendon as a three-year-old, and here we are at five,” said McDonough about the Western Terror mare, who is a half-relation to seven other horses including Classy Western and Classy Guy, who both won over $100,000.
Keith Stanley Debutante
Only three horses will contest the opening race on the program, a $20,000 race for the two-year-old’s at 18:06.
Renewal, a two-year-old from the Emma Stewart stable, will be having her first race track appearance.
She was 14.5m behind Chat Topper (who won a Group 1 since) in a Melton trial on 27 February, before winning a Ballarat trial on 7 March by a neck, in a mile rating of 2m 2.6s.
The American Ideal filly is out of Someone To Love, an un-raced mare who is a half-relation to multiple Group 1 winners, Ladies In Red and Our Little General.
Coverage
Sky Racing 1 and Sky Racing Active will cover all races with Kirsten Graham trackside.
Jacob Bevis will head up TasracingTV’s coverage.
Quaddie Jackpot
There is a $20,000 Quaddie Jackpot on the local TAB, with a projected pool of $100,000 on races five, six, seven and eight.
