Two long years of hard work culminated with Sunday afternoon’s inaugural harness racing meet at Orange’s Towac Park and, appropriately, the opening race of the program was taken out by central west harness racing royalty in the Turnbull family.
Bathurst’s Mitch Turnbull steered $2.30 favourite Adore Ruby, trained by his father Steve, to a comfortable, four-and-a-half metre victory in the Orange City Welcome To Towac Park Pace (1609m), etching his name in the record books as the first driver to claim victory on the grass track.
“It’s really exciting to be the first winner here,” Mitch Turnbull said.
“Dad trains [Adore Ruby] and mum owns it too, so it’s nice to have the family connection there on this one.”
Running from the front row, Turnbull piloted Adore Ruby to the lead on the inside early, but Ruth Shannon ($9.10) loomed two wide at the 1000m mark, looking set to challenge.
The latter fell off quickly as Turnbull maintained pace and Way Up ($7.70) moved into second three wide on the outside, but it too fell off at the top of the straight.
Dad trains it and mum owns it, so it’s nice to have the family connection.- Mitch Turnbull
Ultimately Adore Ruby cruised to a four-and-a-half metre win from Imposing Betty ($23.90) in second, Art Secret ($17.96) was four metres back in third.
“It was an excellent run, the horse got around the track really well, it was a good race,” Turnbull said.
“I was lucky to get two trials here, so I was reasonably familiar with the track.
“You watch it on the grass in New Zealand and they’ve got 17 in a race, not seven, so it was hard to know what to do as a driver a little bit but I was lucky she’s a bit stronger which probably suits the grass.”
Bathurst’s Nathan Hurst drove Remember Mac ($5) to a tight win in the ILB Steel Honan Family Jack Honan Memorial Heat 1 (1609m) after that while John O’Shea piloted Cherry Mahoney ($1.80 fav) to a three-metre win in the third, the CYMS Rugby League Watson Corporate Heat (1609m).
In the fourth, the second heat of the Jack Honan Memorial Series, Not A Bad Move (NZ) ($4.30) saluted before Tuapeka Glory (NZ) ($2.90 fav) came up trumps in the second heat of the Watson Corporate Series.
The meeting was a roaring success, which will be built on in next weekend’s Carnival of Cups finals meet, which Turnbull confirmed he’ll return for.
“Yeah, we’ll bring another truckload over and hopefully get a few wins,” he said.
By Matt Findlay
Reprinted with permission of the Central Western Daily