Memories of two modern day harness racing greats came flooding back thanks to Stinganempire’s victory at Redcliffe yesterday.
The Travis Mackay-trained gelding broke a 30-month drought from the winners’ circle when triumphant over 1780 metres.
After a promising start to his career – winning nine of his first 14 starts – Stinganempire has been limited to just 18 outings since September 2012.
Racing three-wide during the latter stages, the gelding rated 1:59.2 to account for Opals Delight and Pandoras Diamond.
Stinganempire is by 2000 Inter Dominion winner Shakamaker, which retired as Australia’s richest pacer.
Trained by John Justice, Shakamaker was triumphant at 46 of his 81 starts, with his victories including the Victoria, South Australia and Ballarat Cups, two Australian Pacing Gold Finals, two Vicbred Finals and the Western Australia Derby.
Stinganempire’s dam, Channon is an unraced daughter of former outstanding speedster Chandon.
With his career cut short by injury, Chandon won 19 of his 25 starts, with four placings also top his credit.
Chandon had 19 starts at two and three, which yielded 14 wins and three placings.
One of his unplaced efforts was against open age free-for-all company, while the other was in the Australian Derby when it was discovered the son of Classic Garry had damaged his tendon.
After spending a year on the sidelines, Chandon returned to win five of his six starts before injury ended his career on the dawn of the Miracle Mile, for which the five-year-old was the early favourite.
Chandon’s last three starts saw him capture the Ben Hur, Australian Pacing Championship and Queensland Championship to head the Grand Circuit.
His other victories include the Westral Classic, Golden Slipper, Western Australia Derby and Oceania El Dorado.
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PAUL COURTS