Racing: New chum steals the Moment at Albion Park

MICHAEL GUERIN looks at a horse who started racing just this season and in 10 months has come from nothing to taking the most coveted trophy in Australasian trotting. Take A Moment to consider this meteoric rise in harness racing.

BRISBANE - Take A Moment is an appropriate name for New Zealand's latest transtasman champion.

Doesn't really strike you the first time you see it written down or hear it spoken. Just another horse name really.

But after the Canterbury trotter headed home a New Zealand trifecta in the $A200,000 Interdominion Trotting Grand Final on Saturday night maybe his name should be adhered to.

Just Take A Moment to think about this.

At the start of this season Take A Moment had never raced. He was a maiden, just another obscure five-year-old trotter pounding the Canterbury trials tracks like an army of others.

Now he is the Interdominion champion. The best trotter in Australasia after the departure of stablemate Lyell Creek.

In less than 10 months he has won 10 of his 17 starts for $223,241 in stakes. The only times he has finished out of the money are when he has galloped, which you can sort of forgive him for considering this is his first season.

On Saturday night he started from a 20m handicap, attacked the hot favourite Last Sunset in the middle stages and still forged clear to win in a time almost identical to what Lyell Creek trotted to win last month's Rowe Cup.

Now Take A Moment to think about this.

Imagine being asked to pay around $120,000 for a lower class trotter.

The gelding's unbelievable rise to the throne abdicated by Lyell Creek started when trainer Tim Butt decided he wanted him in his stable.

Butt liked what he saw when Take A Moment was winning maiden races so went out and formed a syndicate to buy him for around $120,000.

Two years ago when Graham Bruton bought Lyell Creek for $20,000 that was a good price for a maiden trotter.

But $120,000 for a five-year-old virtually unknown trotter, that is unheard of.

Yet Tim Butt rang his best stable clients, told then he wanted to pay that sort of money for Take A Moment and they said yes. They believed in the young man.

Their faith was not misplaced.

"I actually bought him to win this race," said Butt matter-of-factly as he stood in the Albion Park winner's circle on Saturday night.

"Even back then I thought Lyell might be in the Northern Hemisphere by now and I knew Take A Moment could become the next best trotter in New Zealand.

"So I told my owners what my plan was and they backed me."

That's right. Butt picked out a lower grade trotter, decided it was good enough to win the Interdominion in 10 months and then asked his best owners to buy it even though it was only going to be the second best trotter in his stable.

And he pulled it off.

Of course none of this would be possible unless Take A Moment was an absolute flying machine.

But Take A Moment to think about this.

This Interdominion campaign has not been all beer and skittles for Tim Butt.

In the last six weeks Take A Moment has suffered all sorts of problems, ranging from breaking in his races to developing mud fever which meant he couldn't be worked as hard as Butt would have liked.

On the first night of this carnival he galloped, trotted roughly and finished sixth in his heat. The dream was turning into a nightmare.

Butt didn't panic. He made gear changes and did something he has never done in his career before.

He ripped off Take A Moment's shoes and replaced them.

Shoes on elite trotters are like tyres on Formula One cars. They are meticulously balanced and angled to fit the needs of the individual.

You don't just rip them off in the middle of an Interdominion.

Butt did and it worked.

"Shoes are so important on trotters and we have been helped by some great blacksmiths. We were lucky," said Butt.

Lucky. Tim Butt being modest enough to suggest luck had anything to do with this remarkable, calculated journey from maiden to Interdominion champion in 10 months.

Take A Moment to think about that.