Whangarei Racing Club's Project Promise Race Day

Tomorrow at the Whangarei Racing Club's Project Promise Race Day, a local Ruakaka trainer will be watching from the sidelines instead of participating in the day's activities.
This is one of the drawbacks of having a team of mostly youngsters - most of which are not quite ready for their big day out and instead will remain in the paddock.
For Waipu-based racehorse trainer Brent Wells this will be the case at tomorrow's meeting, where he will find himself in the position of being horseless as far as entries in the day are concerned.
It was the sort of thing that could happen when you operated a breeding, pretraining, schooling and training establishment, he said.
Most of Wells' charges bred at home get educated through to the Ready to Run sales where they are onsold either for himself or other clients.
An adept horseman, Wells has had a love affair with horses since he was an infant on his parents' farm at Maungakaramea. A pony on the farm progressed into much more, with Wells representing Northland five times in the Pony Club Championships, and also as a three-day eventer. He represented New Zealand in Australia and had the honour of riding for Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips in the Under-21 years squad.
From memory, he said the Kiwis were well-placed with Wells managing to jump a clear round on a newly loaned Aussie mount.
 Now in work at his Sherwood Lodge premises at Waipu, Wells has six thoroughbreds he is preparing for racing. Their daily routine is a mixture of working the track at the Ruakaka Racecourse and the beach at Uretiti.
 One of his horses, Stellas Gold, won at Ellerslie in April, taking out the David Peake Plate. She has had a few issues since, but nothing that time won't sort. Hopefully, Stellas Gold will start at Ruakaka in upcoming meetings, with perhaps one or two of the youngsters.
For those of us looking for a good tip in tomorrow's Project Promise Race Day, try your hand in the last race of the day - the Project Promise Northlanders Helping Northlanders 2100.
The horse wearing the No 1 saddle cloth is Ace High, owned by Dean Logan and winner of last week's Caltex Fuelzone Whangarei Cup.
The next race day for the club will be August 5, the 91.6 More FM Thank God It's Friday at the Races Race Day.