Racing: Bruce Almighty keeps on trucking

Stu Manning used to skite about his beach training.

And when outstanding mare Katy Keen came along and won seven in a row he had good reason.

But now there is the opportunity to give the Tauranga horseman a ribbing about it.

And does he bite.

With Katy Keen now retired and safely in foal to Zabeel, most of the rest of the seven-horse Manning team have found stunning form, evidenced by Bruce Almighty's $100,000 Canterbury Gold Cup win at Riccarton on Saturday.

And it's all been off the back of the Manning five-horse float on two separate trips through the South Island.

Not a beach in sight.

Be careful in picking the moment when you suggest that you can have your beach training, that horses obviously train better off the back of a truck. Very careful.

Manning and partner Kay Durrant are due home in Tauranga late today, having left on March 17 with Bruce Almighty, Diamondsareforever, Zillah's Lad and Betty Boop on the truck behind them.

The 4000km took them to Wanganui, Trentham, Riverton, Marlborough and Christchurch.

That trip followed one which started on New Year's Day that took them to the West Coast circuit then down to Gore.

Almost all of us would choose a beach before a truck, but Bruce Almighty, for one, loves the back of that truck.

Previously he'd won seven races, all around the smalls. On his two South Island trips in the past few months he has won the Greymouth Cup, Gore Cup, Taranaki Cup, Marlborough Cup and now the Canterbury Gold Cup to bank $149,763 for Manning and Durrant, who own him as well as prepare him.

His win at the weekend was the fastest Canterbury Gold Cup in 12 years.

Diamondsareforever, a Hawkes Bay Hurdles winner who has also raced as a steeplechaser, paid his way for the trip with wins on the flat at Marlborough and Wingatui.

Bruce Almighty gets his name in part from the 2003 Jim Carry-Morgan Freeman movie of the same name, but only in part.

"He's out of a mare called Striking Angel. Kay's son was killed 12 years ago and his middle name was Bruce. She thought he was an angel, so it all fitted."

The bankroll apart, Manning and his partner have arrived home refreshed, despite all the driving.

"We just took our time," says Manning. "We'd break up the legs on the trip.

"We were in no rush - we're not like those people who as soon as the race is over, the horse is on the truck and they're on the road."

He says the South Island hospitality has been marvellous and some of the friendships he's formed will be for life.

Bruce Almighty will now spell, but Diamondsareforever will continue training along with Electric Kai, who has been spelling since two wins on the first West Coast trip, Zorro's Star and an unnamed Le Bec Fin filly.

Understandably, Manning is keen to see what results from the Zabeel-Katy Keen mating.

He can't wait for the day he can put the resulting yearling into work - on the Tauranga beach.