South Island jockey Chris Johnson is heading north from his Canterbury base to ride at Ruakaka, and will be hoping to improve upon his 96 wins this season.
South Island jockey Chris Johnson is heading north from his Canterbury base to ride at Ruakaka, and will be hoping to improve upon his 96 wins this season.
A "Locals' Day Out" theme, featuring more than 20 Bream Bay businesses celebrating the joy of living and working in Ruakaka, will herald the return of Saturday racing.
The nine-race meeting at Ruakaka Racecourse has attracted strong local entrants, including the closely related last-start winners at Ellerslie, in Smedleyand Playboy Prince. Playboy Prince's dam Letsgoparty is a half-sister to Smedley.
Letsgoparty was the first foal from Party Jet whilst Smedley is the seventh foal. A tough, resolute family, they have come to the fore over the last few weeks and Saturday could provide them with more wins. Smedley, who is trained on the Uretiti Beach by Clayton Stevenson, is a winner of his last two starts at Ellerslie and nearly $20,000 in prize money after eighty-eight starts.
Smedley will be taking on the consistent Francis Drake in the Craig Cogan Builder 2100 metres and this run could be a pre-cursor to tackling the ITM Whangarei Gold Cup on 22 July that he won last year.
Playboy Prince's most impressive win was at Ellerslie on June 3 and that win raised his earnings to just under $50,000 from twenty-four starts. Given he is topweight in the Northland Veterinary Group, rating 75 over 1600 metres, local trainer Kaye Taylor has secured apprentice Darren Danis to take three kilograms of weight off his back.
Finishing just behind him last start, after suffering a little interference, was the Ruakaka-based Kim Knight trained Spider. With an improved track surface from the heavy Ellerslie course and back on his home track Spider should be very hard to beat in the Marine & Engineering Supplies, Marsden Cove Rating 85 race over 1400 metres.
What a great supporter of the winter Saturday racing at Ruakaka is Peter McKay. Peter's team of seven runners this Saturday will be headed by the highly rated Amarula in the $30,000 Bream Bay Design & Print Bowl, a winner of four races at Ruakaka and with a feature win in the Hawkes Bay Guineas.
Not seen since April this year, when he won at Hawke's Bay, the four-year-old by Thorn Park will no doubt be starting a campaign that will head to the Hawkes Bay carnival in the early spring.
Not to be outdone, the leading local stable of Donna Logan and Chris Gibbs look likely to saddle up 19 runners, with an emphasis on the lower band of ratings with mostly three-year-olds.
Chris Gibbs (pictured) and Donna Logan will have 19 runners at Ruakaka tomorrow.
With their best runners resting after the autumn or Brisbane Carnival before starting their spring campaigns, the team has many young and promising horses working through their grades. Green Spirit and Rikki Tikki Tavi proved that when winning at the course on 17 May.
In the feature $30,000 Lawson Cartage Bream Bay Cup, local trainer Kenny Rae heads the ratings with his two well performed South Island runners in Absolut Excelencia and Kaharau. Kaharau was a recent trial winner and then struggled over the last two hundred metres on a heavy eleven track surface at Ellerslie.
South Island jockey Chris Johnson is heading north from his Canterbury base to continue his challenge to maintain the lead in the national jockey's premiership.
Riding at Ruakaka is a rare experience for Johnson, who began his career in the 1980/81 season. It appears that the last time he rode at Ruakaka was on 3rd August 2007 when he rode a winner, Xcape, for the late Dean Logan, Donna Logan and Chris Gibbs stable.
The fifty-three-year old rider has won 96 races this season compared to his best ever season being 1995/96 when he rode one hundred and thirty-nine races.
Five winners behind in the jockey's premiership is the North Island based Danielle Johnson.
