Don Hugo. Photo by Club Menangle - Pacepix
Two of the state’s biggest names will fly the flag for New South Wales in both the $NZ1 Million Race By Betcha and $NZ600,000 TAB Trot at Cambridge on the north Island of New Zealand on Friday night.
Reigning Inter Dominion, Eureka and Miracle Mile champion Don Hugo has once again, come up with a perfect gate two draw for his trainer-driver Luke McCarthy in the Race By Betcha feature bolstering his chances against his class opposition.
The Tony Licastro-owned entire has been doing battle throughout the past two seasons with his fierce racetrack rivals, half-brothers Leap To Fame and Swayzee, with the trio dominating on the Grand Circuit.
Don Hugo has claimed the scalps of both brothers in recent times and is widely recognised as one of the best pacers that has been produced across Australasia in the modern era, his imposing record supporting that notion.
Once again, the five-year-old will go head-to-head with Leap To Fame over the Cambridge mile, McCarthy claiming that with Don Hugo drawing in gate two, and Leap To Fame having to start out in barrier eight, their chances have been hugely enhanced.
“Six months ago, Leap To Fame clearly had the class over Don, but our fella has continued to get better, clearly benefitting from the experience of racing at the top level and the gap between them has narrowed substantially,” McCarthy explained.
“Following his all-the-way win in the Miracle Mile we now know we can beat him, but that said, Leap To Fame is an out-and-out champion and there is no doubt we will have our work cut out to beat him again.”
“My thoughts leading into this race were that, if we are going to win the race, we would need to draw well, considering how strong the field is, and gate two is perfect for us and we should have no excuses.”
Reigning Inter Dominion Trotting champion, The Locomotive will need to overcome his wide gate six draw in the TAB Trot when he comes up against a star-studded field of square gaiters.
Not overly phased by the wide draw, trainer-driver Brad Hewitt said that his horse is in fine fettle and travelled over to New Zealand quite well.
Hewitt was bullish when declaring that he would not be changing the stallion’s preferred racing pattern, adopting his customary bold forward running tactics.
