Racing: Stakes lure Purdon to Pukekohe

Champion trainer Mark Purdon is set to become an Alexandra Park regular again.

Purdon has confirmed a plan he originally indicated to the Herald last month - he is setting up a permanent training base at Pukekohe to be run as a satellite of his Canterbury operation.

While the Pukekohe stable will be significantly smaller and will be restricted to racehorses, it means Purdon's colours will parade at Alexandra Park most weeks.

And the record-breaking trainer says the main reason is simple.

"The stakes at Alexandra Park are too good to ignore any more," he admits.

"With the $15,000 class one races it simply makes sense to campaign a certain sort of horse up here.

"And the northern clubs cater for fillies and mares better than the clubs down south.

"They are the main factors and from now on I would like to think we will have a presence in the north on a permanent basis."

While Purdon will make regular trips north, the team will be guided by Nicole Molander, who will act as northern stable foreperson.

"Nicole started working for us around Christmas when we had a lot of horses up here and she does a great job with them. We are lucky to have her."

Purdon already has an eight-strong winter racing team based at a Pukekohe stable, with the horses working on the main Pukekohe training track.

"I also want to have a regular base year-round because by Christmas we might have 15 horses up here.

"From December until the Auckland Cup carnival in March we should have big numbers and then we have age group races and the Harness Jewels at Cambridge next May.

"This season we had 18 horses at the Jewels and when you have big numbers it is difficult, and not fair, to train them from other people's stables."

Purdon was born and raised in Auckland before moving to Canterbury in 2000 in a move that stunned many in the harness industry.

His latest move could be the forerunner to more southern trainers looking to plunder Alexandra Park riches.

While other major harness racing tracks - Addington and Cambridge in particular - are looking to reduce stakes after a season of poor industry-wide turnovers, the Auckland Trotting Club is expected to announce soon it will maintain stake levels next season.

Those purses have already been good enough to see more southern trainers campaigning teams at Alexandra Park this winter than at any other comparable time in the last decade and with the current stakes trends that looks set to increase.

That will be music to the ears of ATC bosses as horse numbers have been a constant thorn in the club's side, with field size a huge determinant of overall turnover.

One factor which won't make the ATC or several trainers so happy, though, is a new rule which will ban claimers from racing in normal races.

At present horses past their best can downgrade back to lower grade races if they are entered as claimers, thus prolonging their racing careers.

But HRNZ has decreed from October 1 that will no longer be allowed, with horses only allowed to race as claimers in races restricted to claimers.

And that is going to leave a number of northern horses with no career.

COMING HOME
* Champion trainer Mark Purdon is setting up a permanent Auckland stable.
* It will act as satellite arm of his main stable in Canterbury.
* Purdon, formerly from Auckland, says the stakes at Alexandra Park are simply too good to ignore.
* He believes more southern trainers will start to campaign their horses in Auckland.