There was a bittersweet irony to former Bendigo harness racing trainer-driver Chris Svanosio's wins aboard Surbiton Hartbreak and Pinevale Victoria at Lord's Raceway on Tuesday night.
Svanosio, who moved his training base from Bendigo to Romsey late last year, does not know when he will next get the chance to compete at the venue he still regards as his hometrack.
With Harness Racing Victoria moving to a region-based model from today (Thursday) in response to the coronavirus pandemic, Svanosio finds himself away from the Bendigo-based central region and zoned in the east, which has racing bases at Kilmore and Cranbourne.
As he does with most things, Svanosio is taking the new regulations in his stride and is fully supportive of the move.
"I'm just happy to be racing – none of us have anything to complain about, it could be a lot worse," he said.
"We don't know what will happen the next few months, so it was good to go back home and get a couple of winners.
"Any winner from here on in is a bonus, I just hope we can keep on racing as long as we can."
Svanosio, who is enjoying another productive season with 31 training wins and a similar number of driving wins, said he was rapt to get a win for veteran Eddington-based trainer and long-time friend John Douglas on Surbiton Hartbreak.
"He was one of the first people, who ever gave me drives, when I first started years ago," he said.
"I've known John now for a long time.
"I don't drive much for him these days, but we have always been good mates, so it was good to get a winner for him."
Surbiton Hartbreak is pictured during an earlier win at Maryborough.
The Courage Under Fire four-year-old has now won two races in his eight career starts for Douglas, who oversees just a small team of horses.
Svanosio was similarly chuffed to notch a victory with one of his own horses, the improving three-year-old Pinevale Victoria.
"That's her third win for the season, she's not a champion, but she's a real honest little trotter," he said.
"She ran in a Group 1 race a little while ago, it was good to get a win on the board.
"She was bred by Terry Forster and Helen Lyttleton, who used to have the Sandhurst Road milk bar, and have leased her out to a group of Bendigo people, which was exciting for them."
Meanwhile, Svanosio said Norquay and Repeat After Me would be spelled after productive campaigns, which yielded multiple metropolitan wins.
Two of his stable's stars Magicool and Anywhere Hugo will continue to race and are entered at Kilmore on Friday.
"We have a lot of young ones who have just qualified the last few weeks – some there will be races for and some there won't," Svanosio said.
"We'll just play it by ear.
"We'll leave it up to the owners a bit, if they want to give them a spell they can, or if they're happy to have them keep trying to win a race or two, we're happy with that too."
By Kieran Iles