Seven days after he drove his first winner from his first Alexandra Park start, harness racing driver Andrew Fitzgerald now has his eyes firmly set on his second training victory on his home track at Addington Raceway this Friday.
The 21-year-old Cantabrian drove the Lew Driver trained Smackwater Jack to win the $14,791 Rosslands R40 to R55 Junior Driver's Pace at Northern headquarters.
They got up by a head and were the $20 eighth favorite in the 13-horse field.
That victory came a couple of years after Fitzgerald reined his first winner behind the Peter Robertson trained Real Life Hero, who paid a whopping $84.40 to win at Rangiora on February 26, 2015.
His only other winner came behind his former boss's (Brent White's) gelding, Extreme Guest, who paid $17.40 at Phar Lap raceway on January 6 this year.
"It was a great feeling winning first up at Alexandra Park. I really enjoyed driving up there and I got to meet a lot of new people which was part of the reason I made the trip. I’ll look to head up there a bit more especially with Regan Cotter (Racing Manager @ Alexandra Park) making use of junior concessions and holding plenty of junior races.
Fitzgerald is now looking to build on a successful start to his syndication path when Black Art lines up in the Junior Driver’s race at Addington on Friday night.
St Andrews College educated Fitzgerald, who is an independent contractor at Harness Racing New Zealand, recently took out his trainer’s license and has trained one winner.
That was when John Dunn drove Black Art to victory in an up to R51 rated pace at Addington Raceway on August 18, just gone.
It gave instant success to the newly formed Off N Racing Syndicate.
“Black Art has put in four massive runs since and is set to be right in the fight on Friday. He turned up fit and ready to go when we brought him off Tim Trathen, and I think he’s thrived on a change of environment and being on the beach.”
“His win first-up didn't’t come as too much of a surprise as he had only been beaten a nose a few starts before that for Tim, and his work at home is really good so I was quietly confident he could win,” Fitzgerald said.
“I have some flexibility with my job so I have the time to train one in the mornings, but eventually the busier I get and the more I move into the administration side of the industry I will probably have to give up the training and driving. But at the moment the owners are very supportive of me having a crack to drive a winner that I train,” he added.
He said he got his white and black colours made up just to get his brand out there.
“They had some instant success when Living Glory won at Addington a few months back so hopefully people are starting to associate the brand with me and my syndicates.
“Syndication is the way our industry is going. You only have to look at the Australia thoroughbreds to see Syndicates make up a huge part of their ownerships.
“Owning a horse by yourself isn’t possible for the mums, dads and youth people of NZ. Syndication opens up horse ownership to a much larger percentage of the horse population,” said Fitzgerald.
He said Stephen Hunt of Australia was his major supporter early on.
“I’ve actually only met Stephen once at the Miracle Mile, but he showed interest through Twitter one day and organised a group of owners in Australia to take a major share in Extreme Guest and then again when I found Black Art. Without his support it would not have got off the ground.
“There has been interest in Black Art from Australia so no doubt he will end up over there, either for new owners or we may send him ourselves which will be great as Stephen and his group will be able to see them race in person,” Fitzgerald said.
So who is Andrew Fitzgerald, who started out in the game helping out his uncle Wayne Higgs during the school holidays?
Here are a few facts:
Born and raised: Christchurch
Achievements outside of racing – World Pipeband Champion with the St Andrew’s College Juvenile Pipeband in Glasgow Scotland in 2013.
– Left school and worked for Christchurch trainer, Peter Robertson.
– Headed over to David Aiken’s in Melbourne in 2015 for a 3 month stint, drove a winner, Yankee Sister at Ballarat.
– After returning from Australia, Andrew did some odd jobs before linking up with Rosedale Farm, run by Ken and Anne Marie Spicer for the 2016 Yearling Sales.
“Yearling prep and sales was another part of the industry I hadn’t had anything to do with before and the sales gave me the chance to make a lot of contacts from around NZ/Aus.
“After the yearling sales Andrew also worked for three months at Harnesslink. “You could say I was experiencing the industry from every angle, but I probably was not ready nor had the experience to be successful in that game at a young age”
“Shortly after Brent White rung needing a worker for a month as one of his workers had been injured. I went for a month and ended up staying for seven months”
“Brent was really good to work for, he is a great trainer and whenever he lines one up it is ready to win. I still ring Whitey for tips or advice and him and his partner Alanna helped me a lot when I worked for them and they continue to even now.
“When I was at Brent’s I had been doing a bit of syndication and form for races and really enjoyed it and I wanted to pursue it as a full time gig.
“I took a proposal to HRNZ to hopefully drive turnover and hopefully attract young people to the races and to be part of the industry. The HRNZ board liked it and the NZ Racing board with their recently funding announcements has put their support behind the youth of all racing codes with substantial funding which really helps get some of the ideas of the Youth council off the ground,” Fitzgerald said.
He is also part of the HRNZ Youth Council which includes David Branch, Regan Cotter, and Stevie Golding as well as a range of others.
“It’s a great group of people and I’m pretty excited about some of the ideas that have come out of it which will be rolling out soon. We have been going around trying to talk to as many young people and get their thoughts on what we need to do to attract their friends to the races.”
“None of my school friends have any interest in racing. They see it as an older persons sport and that disappoints me because as an industry we can offer so much more than a night drinking in town can. It was a common theme around the table and hopefully we can sit down in the years to come and be able to say that we have made a difference.
“I live and breathe the industry and I have probably upset some people along the road with my opinions, but I don’t set out to do that. I’ve got some goals that some people would say are too ambitious but I don’t mind aiming for the top and failing,” he said.
by Duane Ranger