.
Today was little Emily's big day. Her first run in an official trial, at Rangiora racetrack, with the carrot of a qualification as a racehorse at the end ...
Murray and Emily arrived from Motukarara, Wendy and the other owners, John and Frank, and Faye from Hornby (representing me, in Australia) all foregathered. Best friends Robin and Geraldine Wilson came up from Kaiapoi ... I was sitting, with a link to Wendy's video-phone, in Yamba, NSW ...
A little hiccough. My colours haven't been worn on the racetrack for a few years. I had loudly chucked the game in disappointed disgust. And when Murray came to put them on they er ... didn't fit. Shrunk? Or has Murray's chest expanded ... So Emily paraded out in the stable colours ...
I was fairly sure that Emily could do the necessary time. She had cruised faultlessly through her two learner's heats. But, there was a but. The opposition. Oh, it didn't matter whether she 'won' the trial or finished last, as long as she trotted cleanly and did the time. But she had drawn alley one, against the rails, in a slightly curious field
One two year old filly (her); one three year-old, pacing-bred, filly which, the previous week had paced, galloped, and then impressively won the heat; one six year-old (!) newcomer from the wowee Kypros Kotzikas team; and another three year-old from the top Mark Jones stable. All girls! Well, I reckoned, all (all? huh!) Emily and Murray had to do was keep clear of everyone ... because there was a fair chance of a bit of a scrimmage at the start. And she was right next to the speedy but unconvincingly-mannered "pacer" (driver the Orange Roughie, NZ Champion).
Scrimmage indeed there was. Emily threw in three or four frightened steps as her neighbour took off, but she managed to squeeze niftily through on the inside of the terminally galloping horse, and headed off in pursuit of the only other survivor. So it came down to a two-horse affair. Emily sat neatly behind the solidly-trotting six-year old, Lavra Segil, and ran on nicely in the straight to win the basically uncontested heat. Four and a half seconds inside the time required.
All was jubilation. Until the bad news came through. Her four (well, maybe five) frightened paces disqualified her from Qualification. New rule. Well, rules are rules, but that one seems a bit extreme. I mean, will we have to run qualifying heats as time trials so that no other horse can interfere physically or mentally with another? And if 'no bobbly beginning' is to be the rule for harness horses, I think that more than half the trotters racing in New Zealand today would have to re-qualify. Even France isn't so perfectionist. But, there you are. Rules is rules.
So, we shall have to foregather next week for another go, before the young lass can be put out to finish growing. Disappointing. But I have always been a passionate advocate of the French rules that disqualify breaking horses (more especially during a race). It is, however, a little surprising that HRNZ can initiate a rule such as today's for a (two-year-old) qualifying effort, but allows the most disgraceful exhibitions on race-day ...
Sour grapes? Not really. Just a wee bit of sadness, and a fair bit of incomprehension at the inconsistency of the harness code.
Let's hope we don't have to face today's rodeo performers next week, or there could be horrid, expensive accidents again. Oh well, the other trot on the programme only went 2 1/2 seconds faster than ours ... perhaps that would be safer ...?
1 comment:
Post a Comment